Population boom
I refer to the excellent PCP article by Gen Moeen U Ahmed on food security in the country where he touched on the issue of population boom and consequent problems. He has also emphasised that this is really the key issue because if the population cannot be held in check, no attempt to improve the lot of the nation will produce any results, rather the situation will get worse and worse. He mentioned that population of 70 million in 1971 has now increased to 150 million and is likely to reach 210 million in a few years with consequent loss of cultivable land for food.
There are many who think that there is safety in numbers and that a large population is a great asset. This is only so if the population can be sustained easily by the land with enough to spare for cattle and other animals, parks, woodland, forests, towns, cities, roads etc. D.L Roy in a famous song mentioned about the population of whole India as 33 crore about a century ago (tetrish koti mora nahi kabhu heen). Tagore castigated the Bengalees a few years later as not being fully mature. Now all over the sub-continent (including Bangladesh) the population has grown more than fourty-fold. Certainly such a situation cannot continue. Disease, famine, war, climate change and natural disasters etc are usually Nature's way of achieving balance, but it is too horrible to contemplate even though we all are aware of these dangers.
Of course the nation must put successful family planning of at most two children (with suitable rewards for those who comply and penalty for those who don't) as the primary objective to get the population in a downward trend. We must also not talk as if our numbers were a point of strength. I do not see this number game quoted in European countries much except as a threat to other countries within the EU for jobs, resources etc. If Turkey had a population of about 30 million instead of 80, I think its membership of EU would have come much quicker.
I would request our writers and intellectuals to spread the message that it is not our numbers, but the quality of our health and personality (maturity, knowledge, wisdom etc) which is the source of strength.
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