For the last couple of years, Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu has been advocating against population control measures.
He has been openly asking the youth to marry at an early age and give birth to more than two children. He has been expressing anguish over the way the youth are becoming career-oriented and ignoring family life.
“If we take up population control, very soon India will become like Japan with more aged people and less youth force. The country needs more and more young people,” he said several times in the past.
However, the actual reason for Naidu’s fear is not growing number of old people. He apparently fears if there is a fall in population due to strict implementation of population control measures, the fund flow from the Centre would come down as less population growth is an indicator to the economic growth.
Secondly, Naidu also fears if the population comes down, there would be reduction in the number of assembly and parliament seats as well.
He expressed this concern while addressing the Collectors’ Conference which concluded in Amaravati on Wednesday.He told the Collectors that he had been expressing this doubt right from the days of former Prime Minister A B Vajpayee.
He pointed out that 10 assembly seats were reduced in Andhra Pradesh while there was an increase of 14 seats in Telangana owing to migration as per the 2001 census.
He said he had raised the issue during the Vajpayee regime and as a result, the population of 1971 was used as a cut-off mark under the 14th Finance Commission.
“I have implemented measures to control population during my earlier stint as chief minister. We even competed with Kerala in the matter of population control,” Naidu said.
He expressed doubts over the intention of the 15th Finance Commission’s decision to take the 2011 Census as a benchmark.“If that happens, we will forego more,” Naidu said, adding that the number of Parliament seats across South India would also be reduced.