Political parties and activists in the Buldhana district have urged the MVA government to drop “embarrassing objects” from the family planning kits, saying that health workers were finding it awkward to display these items during the awareness drive.
The kits contain, among other things, rubber models of male and female reproductive organs, which the accredited social health activist (ASHA) workers are embarrassed to carry and display during the awareness campaign, and they want these objects to be removed from the kits, leader of a political outfit said.
The district health officials, however, said the present kits are effective in creating awareness about family planning and sexual hygiene. The Health Department has distributed family planning counselling kits in Buldhana and other districts of the state to create awareness about birth control, population control and for maintaining sexual hygiene and preventing diseases like AIDS. Each kit contains models of male and female reproductive organs, medicines and other things.
The Vidarbha pradesh president of Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatna, Prashant Dikkar, said it was not appropriate to include the model of reproductive organs in the kit. “How will the ASHA workers explain about it? It is embarrassing for them. It is not useful at all. The government has lost its mind,” he said.
Tabbassum Begum, a social worker from Buldhana, said that some ASHA workers had approached her saying that they feel shy and embarrassed to show the reproductive organ models during the counselling sessions in villages. “The programme is very good, but I feel the government should look into this aspect and remove the reproductive organ models from the kit,” she said. BJP leader Chitra Wagh also tweeted on the issue and criticised the government saying it has “lost its mind”.
A senior health official from Buldhana said the kit is good for creating awareness about birth control and sexual hygiene. “During the awareness drive, male health workers counsel only men, while female workers provide counselling to women,” he said. A few workers may have doubts about using these kits, but there is no opposition to it, he said.
