Phase 7 constituencies lag on contraceptive use, mobile phones for women

The voting to elect the 18th Lok Sabha concludes on Saturday

The majority of constituencies going to polls on June 1 are unlikely to meet goals on modern contraceptive use and mobile phone ownership for women even by 2030.

Over half of the 57 constituencies voting in the final phase are failing on 20 out of 33 sustainable development goals (SDGs), such as health insurance, access to basic services, and modern contraceptive use, set to be achieved by 2030, according to a Business Standard analysis of data from a study titled ‘Call for action: presenting constituency-level data on population, health and socioeconomic wellbeing related to 2030 Sustainable Development Goals for India’.

The study by authors S.V. Subramanian, Amar Patnaik, and Rockli Kim appeared in the academic journal The Lancet in February 2024.

The majority of constituencies are significantly behind on health insurance, with 98.3 per cent and 94.7 per cent lagging for women and men, respectively. Around 93 per cent are off-target concerning access to basic services and modern contraceptive use (chart 1).

Off-target constituencies are those that have not achieved the SDG goal by 2021 and will fail to meet it by 2030 due to negative or limited improvement between 2016 and 2021. Conversely, on-target constituencies are those that have not achieved the target but are likely to by 2030 due to improvement between 2016 and 2021.

Kendarpura in Odisha has the lowest use of modern contraception at 47.8 per cent, according to an analysis of the National Family Health Survey 2019-21 (NFHS-5) by the study. It has declined from 65.1 per cent in NFHS-4 (2015-16). More than 60 per cent of women in Jharkhand’s Rajmahal do not own a mobile phone (chart 2).

The constituencies have made strides in some areas. All constituencies have successfully addressed adolescent pregnancy among 10-14-year-olds.

Around 90 per cent of constituencies have met the target for reducing tobacco use among women. The rest, 1.8 per cent and 8.8 per cent, are on-target and off-target, respectively. More than half have achieved the goal of multidimensional poverty by 2021 (chart 3).

Faridkot (SC) in Punjab is leading with the lowest rate of adolescent pregnancy (10-14) at 0.02 per cent in NFHS-5. Another constituency in Punjab, Khadoor Sahib, was the best-performing with minimal tobacco use among women at 0.02 per cent.

Kolkata Uttar in West Bengal had the lowest multidimensional poverty rate at 1.4 per cent in NFHS-5 (chart 4).