Centre should ban MPs, MLAs with more than two children from contesting polls: Ajit Pawar
Considering that India’s population has reached 1.42 billion, everyone should stop after having one or two children for the betterment of their own region, district, state and country, Pawar said
Leader of the opposition and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) senior member Ajit Pawar on Sunday said that the Centre should introduce legislation barring legislators with more than two children from contesting elections. Pawar said that those having more than two children should not be given any concessions.
Considering that India’s population has reached 1.42 billion, everyone should stop after having one or two children for the betterment of their own region, district, state and country, Pawar said. “There should be no concessions given to people who have more than two children,” he said.
The NCP leader made these remarks during a function at Baramati while referring to reports of India’s population set to surpass that of China by mid-2023. According to the latest data from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), India is expected to pip China in the race for ‘most populous country’ by the middle of this year.
Pawar recalled how he, along with others in the former Vilasrao Deshmukh-led state government, had been apprehensive while deciding that candidates aspiring to contest elections to local bodies such as gram panchayats, zilla parishads and taluka panchayats would be considered ineligible if they had three children. “People ask why a similar decision wasn’t taken with regard to MPs and MLAs. I tell them that it is not in our hands but in the hands of the Centre. It is our demand that the Centre take such a decision,” Pawar said. People will become more aware and conscious about the issue if they are not given any concessions, he added.
The former deputy chief minister said that he had asserted that all political parties should take up this issue seriously and that he had raised the issue earlier as well. “My grandfather used to tell me that when we got independence, our population was 35 crores while it has now reached 142 crores and for that, we are all responsible,” Pawar had said in the state legislative assembly.
