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However much a mother may love her children, it is all but impossible for her to provide high-quality child care if she herself is poor and oppressed, illiterate and uninformed, anaemic and unhealthy, has five or six other children, lives in a slum or shanty, has neither clean water nor safe sanitation, and if she is without the necessary support either from health services, or from her society, or from the father of her children.
- Vulimiri Ramalingaswami, "The Asian Enigma"
Government of India has been making several efforts in developing health and population policies. However, there are several problems in the implementation of appropriate interventions due to poverty, gender discrimination, illiteracy in the population. According to 2011 census, only 65.56% of Indian women are literate. The literacy level of women can affect
reproductive behaviour, use of contraceptives, health and upbringing of children, proper hygienic practices, access to employment and overall status of women in the society. An early marriage and child-birth is a major determinant of women’s health and is also responsible for the prevailing wide variation in the socio-economic status. Inadequate and improper utilization of health facilities and wide spread anaemia among all the reproductive age women leading to high maternal mortality (540 maternal deaths per one lakh live births). Because of prevailing culture and traditional practices in India, the health and nutritional status of women becoming worse effected. India's maternal mortality rates in rural areas are among the world's highest. From a global perspective, Indian accounts for 19 percent of all lives births and 27 percent of all maternal deaths.
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