Centre Sets Up High-Powered Committee to Look into Challenges Arising from Fast Population Growth-

Opposition decried the move terming it as an RSS-BJP agenda against the Muslim community. Reports ETV Bharat's Gautam Debroy.

New Delhi: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday said that a high-powered committee will be set up to consider challenges arising from fast population growth.

"The Government will form a high-powered committee for an extensive consideration of the challenges arising from fast population growth and demographic changes. The committee will be mandated to make recommendations for addressing these challenges comprehensively in relation to the goal of ‘Viksit Bharat’," Sitharaman while presenting the interim budget of the Narendra Modi government.

Later speaking to reporters, Ajay Seth, Secretary of the Department of Economic Affairs said that the terms and references of the committee will be chalked out soon. “The committee will elaborately look into the effect of population growth," added Seth.

The announcement came during the presentation of the interim budget in the Lok Sabha by the Union Finance Minister under the tagline "societal changes."

The opposition block, however, termed the announcement as a strategy of the BJP-led government "to target a particular community." "It's always an agenda of the BJP-RSS government to target the minority Muslim community. Using the interim budget, the Centre is trying to achieve their target," Hannan Mollah, former MP and CPM Central Committee Member told ETV Bharat.

The government has always been trying to pass the Population Control Bill, however, due to clear objections from even some of its allies, they are not able to pass the Bill, Mollah said.

On several occasions, several BJP MPs tabled private members' bills in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha seeking an Act to control population growth. Even some of the BJP-ruled states have already started working on the agenda of population growth control.

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma who always remains vocal against population growth said that his government has started adopting population control policy.

Interestingly, a new financial support scheme of the Assam government for rural women entrepreneurs has been rolled out with a few conditions, including a cap on the number of children they have.

While women from general and OBC categories cannot have more than three children if they wish to avail of the scheme, the limit is four children for women from Scheduled Tribes (STs) and Scheduled Castes (SCs).

The scheme named 'Mukhyamantri Mahila Udyamita Abhiyaan' (MMUA) was announced in the second week of January. Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that gradually, all beneficiary schemes by the state government would be tied to such "population norms".

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