So all “great” minds think alike.

With all this, you will note that the people in Kerala do not necessarily follow what the kooks say. With the advent of education, women have been taking the lead in adopting family planning measures, mostly without consultation with the man, and across the faith spectrum. This is because, all said and done, many men do not adopt such measures. No fertile woman, no children. Of course, widow remarriage among Muslims (and in Hindus, at least in Kerala, though to a lower extent) could involve certain reconsiderations. And there are other considerations than finance involved in producing children. A family isn’t a goat farm, for God’s sake! So the “cash for kids” might not have many takers. If they had promised to support adoption, that would have been a welcome (and painless) way of increasing the number of Christians. No takers?

So poor John Dayal’s complaint is that the Christians have a low rate of growth? Could he attribute it to their comparatively better levels of education? The only way to encourage people to have more kids is to cut down on their level of education. This is slightly difficult. So, even if the Church says next that the earth was created in 4004 BC, there might not be any takers – for a long time.

Worried by the dwindling numbers of its flock, the Catholic Church in Kerala is planning a host of schemes to promote larger families among the financially sound. Among the promotional measures would be providing educational incentives for fourth child in the family.

The Christian community has seen a decline in numbers because of smaller families over the last two generations in Independent India. “By and large, our rate of growth is the lowest amongst religious communities in the country,” the Secretary General, All India Christian Council and Ex President of the All India Catholic Union, John Dayal told The Pioneer.

The law prohibiting a person having more than two children from contesting panchayat elections was challenged in the Supreme Court on Friday by Samajwadi Party MP Abu Asim Azmi on the ground that it violated the Islamic dictat that no Muslim would restrict birth of children.

…”Not to kill any unborn child or restrict its birth either before or post conceiving is the essential and integral part of Islam,”he said and termed the Maharashtra local bodies norm framed in the year 2000 as violative of the fundamental rights of Muslims.