Among the many disqualifying conditions for Delhi government’s cash transfer scheme for women — the Delhi Lakshmi Yojana, approved on Tuesday — is having more than three living children. This eligibility condition is perhaps one of its kind among the various cash transfer schemes for women, including those in operation in other Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled states. Who is most likely to lose out because of this criterion? HT has analysed the 2019-21 National Family Health Survey (NFHS) data to answer this question.
Market Context
The probability of exclusion can be very different from the magnitude of exclusion here. Among major religions in Delhi, Muslims had a higher share of women with more than three children (16%) than Hindu (7.6%) or Sikh women (4.1%). However, because Hindu women make up 84.6% of women in Delhi, 75% of women with more than three children are Hindu. A breakup by caste category shows that 34% of all women with more than three children are from non-SC/ST/OBC castes among Hindu, 26% are SC, 23% are Muslim, and 14% are OBC.
What does NFHS tell us about share of women with number of living children in Delhi?
Compared with the all-India average, women in Delhi tend to have fewer children. Only 8.5% of them had more than three living children, compared with 10.5% at the national level, the data shows. The share rises sharply among poorer households. Among women in the poorest 20% households by asset class in Delhi, 14.8% had more than three living children. The share also increases with age. It was 25% among women aged 45-49 years and 13.5% among those aged 35-39. Viewed another way, 34% women excluded because of this criterion would be from the poorest quintile and 77% of age 35 or higher in 2019-21.
Source
The 2011 Census numbers are significantly dated. The unit-level data from the latest NFHS (2023-24) has not yet been released. This leaves the 2019-21 NFHS data as the only scientifically conducted sample survey that provides insights into the distribution of women by number of children they have. Since the NFHS covers women in the 15-49 age group (the reproductive age group), and it is now five-seven years since the survey, the trends seen in the NFHS might well be true for the 21-60 age group, the age-group Delhi Lakshmi Yojana is targeting.
