The findings of a study, the first-ever district-level examination of unintended pregnancies from nationwide data, have been revealing and significant. Published in the journal, BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, the research has revealed that as many as 82 districts of India have a rate of unwanted pregnancies that is higher than the national average. Three of Bengal’s districts — Birbhum, Malda and North Dinajpur — figure among these hot spots, as do 30 districts in Bihar, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, 8 in Madhya Pradesh, 6 in Delhi, 4 in Haryana and 3 each in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh. The regional variations throw up intriguing questions. India’s northern states, known for their combination of low literacy — Bihar’s literacy rate is 61.7% while Uttar Pradesh’s is 73% — conservative social norms, and lower individual agency for women, offer a potent cocktail of social factors that often leads to unwanted pregnancies. But Kerala and Delhi, educated, urban, economic hubs, that were expected to buck such regressive trends, also found themselves amidst the geographical clusters that have a rate of unintended pregnancies higher than the national average. This makes it evident that demographic signifiers like higher income and education and better access to healthcare need not always secure women’s lives, choices or their right over their bodies. The cultural preference for a male child remains a formidable opponent to the forces of progress even in urbanised geographies that are relatively affluent. Given the pervasive culture of violence against women, it is also worth asking whether women whose pregnancies are the result of sexual assault and other crimes receive the same kind of access to healthcare and support as their peers.

The data collated from this study also have uses other than challenging — dismantling — prevalent assumptions. For instance, the information that has been unearthed could help policy zero in on areas where the use of contraception is low and then resolve the problem. Equally important is the data’s potential to identify future courses of further research. The fact that as many as eight out of Kerala’s 14 districts show a high propensity of unintended pregnancies should lead to follow-up queries about why a state with the best maternal and childcare indices has failed to check undesirable conceptions. Resources and manpower should not be constraints for future research projects in this direction: the answers would have a bearing on national welfare.