BJP on Saturday said population control should be seen as a social issue and not a religious one and called for providing incentives to people to promote family planning.
“Population control is not a religious issue. It’s a social issue for the entire country”, BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu told reporters here.
Earlier this week, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa, fresh from his China visit, favoured a two -child norm and denying government facilities and benefits to families with more than two children and called for a debate.
Welcoming Yeddyurappa’s initiative, Mr. Naidu suggested giving incentives to those who follow family planning “so that others also follow the same“.
Stressing that population control was a “very, very important issue”, he said cutting across party lines, people should frankly and openly discuss it and come out with meaningful and practical suggestions in the larger interest of the people.
On the church attack near Bangalore on Thursday, he said such things are condemnable, but deplored attempts to overplay it and create unnecessary apprehension in the minds of people.
If an attack on places of worship happen in other states ruled by other parties, people dismiss it saying these things keep happening. But when it happens in BJP-ruled states, it becomes banner headline, he said.
