- Bengal's Total Fertility Rate (TFR) is down by 17.6% in the last ten years, as per the SRS's September report
- Bengal's women 15-49 years are more literate than the country's average
- The figures are compared between SRS surveys in 2011-13 and 2021-23
Bengal's Total Fertility Rate (TFR) has gone down by 17.6 percent during the last decade, the September report of the Sample Registration Survey (SRS) indicates.
The report also points out that female literacy among women aged 15-49 years in the state is above the national level.
Rural Bengal witnessed a steeper fall of 16.7 percent as against 8.3 percent in urban Bengal. This trend reflects the national TFR fall of 16.7 percent, according to comparisons between the 2011-13 and 2021-23 SRS surveys.
TFR captures the average number of children a woman will have in her childbearing life. Bengal's TFR for 2023 was 1.3, falling from 1.7 ten years ago, and below the 2.1 replacement rate to keep the population stable.
The urban TFR for the state is the lowest in India at 1.1, and that for rural Bengal is the second lowest in the country at 1.4.
The study highlights the contribution of women's education to fertility patterns, as 93.1 percent of women between the ages of 15 and 49 in Bengal are literate, against the country's overall rate of 90.5 percent. Approximately one in every four women has undergone education to middle school level.
Economist Avirup Sarkar has termed the declining TFR as a positive development, which indicates better maternal, and child health, greater gender empowerment, and greater female workforce participation.
At the country level, India's TFR in 2023 was 1.9, rural was 2.1, and urban was 1.5. For major states, the highest TFR was that of Bihar at 2.8, followed by Uttar Pradesh (2.6), Madhya Pradesh (2.4), and Rajasthan (2.3), while the lowest was Delhi at 1.2, followed by Bengal and Tamil Nadu at 1.3.
SRS Age-Specific Fertility Rates (ASFR) data indicates that the highest fertility in the country is among women in the 25-29 age groups at 136.3, while in Bengal, it is the lowest in India at 75.4. The highest ASFR in Bengal is among the 20-24 year age group, at 96.9, which falls below the national rate of 107.5.
Yet, the ASFR for the age group of 15-19 is still quite high at 23.3 as against the national average of 11, indicating continued alarm at the incidence of child marriages in the state.
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