Munni Devi is 54. It’s been 20 years since she had her last child. The 16 years before that are a blur. From the time she got married at the age of 17 and had her first child a year later, to when she delivered her ninth in 1994, life was a constant circle of bearing a child, deliveries and child care. She wanted to go in for birth control but says her mother-in-law Indrani Devi wouldn’t let her. So when Indrani died, with Munni pregnant the ninth time, she approached a quack and got some pills to try and terminate the baby. It didn’t work, only left her sick. But after that, she says, she ensured she didn’t have another baby. It was mostly due to lack of privacy, Munni admits. Their eldest daughter was by then 15 and the 11-member family lived together in three small rooms. Munni Devi also recalls the constant struggle for money those days — to get the deliveries done in hospital, for vaccinations for her three sons and six daughters, and eventually to ensure they all completed their studies. Her husband Badlu Rajpoot, 61, is a daily wager who gets work hardly 15 days a month. Most months, he manages to earn no more than Rs 2,000, while two of their sons bring in another Rs 6,000. One of their sons suffers from polio, while only two, both girls, managed to complete their graduation. The youngest, a girl, has just enrolled into BA. None of the three boys studied beyond middle school. Munni Devi herself has high blood pressure. The family lives on the ground floor of a pucca house Badlu’s father built. Known as ‘Rajpoot Bhawan’, it is shared by Badlu’s family and the families of his two other brothers. With two of Badlu’s daughters married now, there is some more space at home. Munni sleeps with her four daughters on the floor in one room while the sons sleep with their father in another. Beds take up too much space and have been dispensed with. The third room, which falls right after the entrance, is used as a guest room. A television set occupies prime space here. The washing machine, another proud possession, is placed in the verandah. Both Munni and Badlu have heard of the recent speeches by Hindutva leaders exhorting Hindus to have more children, including the VHP’s call for as many as 10 of them, in order to “keep up Hindu numbers”. Badlu doesn’t get into all that but, according to him, a bigger family provides “protection”. He also admits his wife always wanted a smaller family. The first time Munni put up a serious protest was after the birth of their second son and fifth child, Surendra, but Badlu shot her down saying more children meant more earning hands. Munni says he was constantly drunk those days, and she didn’t dare argue too much. Her mother-in-law told her tubectomy was unsafe and would put Munni’s life at risk. Bitterly, Munni points out that she became the “scapegoat” as Badlu’s brothers Munna (38) and Sadlu (45) never succumbed to such pressure from Indrani. Munna has a son and a daughter while Sadlu has two sons and a daughter. There was another reason they didn’t stop having children, Munni admits. Her husband and mother-in-law wanted more sons than daughters. “My husband neither took any precaution himself nor allowed me to take contraceptives for family planning,” she says. After Indrani’s death though, even Badlu had a change of heart. A neighbour told them about this man who gave pills to help abort a child, and he took Munni to him. The pills didn’t help. Though the child was left unhurt, Munni fell seriously ill. “I had to be bedridden for several weeks because of weakness caused by the pills. My other daughters cooked food for the family while elderly women from neighbouring families looked after me,” she says. Munni and Badlu got married in 1978, when she was just 17. Within a year she gave birth to her first child — a girl, Soni. After two years, she delivered twin girls Sita and Gita. She proceeded to have Shyam, Surendra, Radha, Priya, Abhishek and Shanu, a child every two years. Indrani helped look after the children but Munni remembers the long hours of cooking food for the large family and the piles of clothes to be washed, for which she had no help. Many times her body, weakened after a recent delivery, protested. After Indrani died, Munni remembers having to take all of the nine children to wherever she had to go, even if it was for a brief errand. And when she couldn’t take them along, she left behind strict instructions that the children should be home before evening. The Pandeganj road nearby has a busy market and heavy traffic from 9 am to 11 pm. She worried constantly, particularly for her girls. Munni was also scared her sons may fall into bad company. Around 10 years ago, Shyam (then 20) and Surendra (then 18), both of whom had dropped out of school after Class VI, started selling garments from temporary stalls on the same Pandeganj road. Their earnings of around Rs 6,000 a month eased the family’s burden somewhat. Since the sons started working, Munni says with a big smile, the family has bought a scooter as well as the washing-machine and TV, all on instalments. Munni’s greatest worry now is saving enough to marry off her four daughters. Even with the little the family earns, Munni ensures that she puts aside Rs 3,000 a month for their wedding. Soni got married 14 years ago and Sita 10 years ago, to labourers. While Gita is the same age as Sita, Munni and Badlu couldn’t get her married because they couldn’t put together enough money. That struggle continues. All these years later, Badlu doesn’t ever regret having the large family, he says. His family’s “protection” was most important for him, he adds, as they live in an area of the old city where clashes are common in the name of religion and caste. “If I have three sons, my family is protected. If one of them sacrifices himself for the family, there will be others to continue the family’s name.” Justifying not using birth control, he adds that “children are a gift of god. He who gifts us children also takes care of them. I preferred to give my children good food for a healthy life instead of education.” Pointing to his wife, Badlu adds that she is the perfect example that having too many children does not affect a woman’s health. “You can see my wife is still healthy and so am I. I continue to work as a labourer, even at my age.” Munni doesn’t say anything to that. Instead, she targets leaders of the VHP and other Sangh affiliates advising Hindus to have more children. “These leaders themselves prefer to have only one or two children,” she says. “They send their children abroad for better education. They are misguiding people my making appeals in the name of religion to get votes.”
