z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-04.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 271
ON MEASURES FOR BIRTH-CONTROL 271
France and Germany were 22.2, 15 and 19 respectively. In 1900 the birth-rate in Germany was 35.6 but in 1933 it came down to 14.7. Italy and France also have their birth-rates much reduced since that time. In England the birthrate was 33.9 in 1851-55 but in 1931 it was lowered to 15.3. Our birth-rate is practically stationary for the last fifty years and hence it would be unwise for us to imitate the efforts of other countries towards raising that rate.
It is quite natural for imperialists to lament the slackening of the rate of increase of the people of their race and it is not surprising that they should raise cries like “Renew or Die”. It is, however, strange to see that those cries should make even some educated persons suspicious about the benefits of birth-control. An article, “Renew or Die”, by Sir Leo Chiozza Money in “The Nineteenth Century and After” for February 1938 will illustrate the point. This writer has assumed that white leadership is necessary for the good of all humanity and has raised a cry to arrest the decline in the number of the white people. Now, in the first place, many will refuse to admit that white supremacy has benefitted the world and secondly few educated persons will be prepared to go to the length of maintaining that the decline in the number of white people will bring down any calamity upon humanity. Besides this, the postulates of this person are all wrong. He has taken it for granted that the birth-rate in England will gradually become lower and lower and that in the year 2,035 the population of England will be reduced to 4,400,000 (44 lacs). But the facts are that the birth-rate in England is increasing instead of going down. In 1933 it was 14.4 but in July 1938 it becomes 15.3. Similarly whereas the writer has estimated that the population of England and Wales in 1940 would be only 40,700,000, the actual figure for 1937 there was already 41,031,000 and it is increasing at the rate of 190,000 people per year. These facts will show that one must take the precaution of not being misled by such articles.
Emigration is sometimes suggested as a remedy for finding an outlet to over-population but that remedy also is not very promising. Compulsion in emigration, amounting to transportation is out of question. Very few persons have the courage and the inclination necessary for leaving one’s own country, endeared to one’s heart by reminiscences of childhood and the presence of relatives and friends and made agreeable by a suitable climate and other factors and to repair to a distant land in which there is the danger of the climate being found to be an unsuitable one and in which the inhabitants are different from oneself in language, customs and manners. Generally, people willing to emigrate are those who are fit to be good citizens and who are able and energetic. It is really a loss to the motherland that such people should emigrate. These persons can easily maintain themselves in their own country but ambition impels them to try to better their lot by going to distant lands. Emigration is practically useless in the case of persons who are handicapped either physically or mentally or