Events & Personalities
Preserving the Parsis
The ministry of Minority Affairs of the Government of India (GoI) launched the Jiyo Parsi scheme in New Delhi on September 23, 2013, aimed at containing the population decline of Parsis in India. Parzor Foundation and the Bombay Parsi Punchayet will be extending active support to the scheme, to implement which a sum of Rs 10 crores has been sanctioned by the GoI for use over a period of four years.
"This is a small step to pay our debt to the Parsi community for their contribution to the country. We cannot afford to lose this community,” stated minister of Minority Affairs K. Rahman Khan at the launch. Several reasons for the shrinking numbers have been listed by studies conducted by the National Commission for Minorities as well as the Parzor Foundation and Tata Institute of Social Sciences, mentioned a report in The Times of India (TOI) on September 24, 2013. These include late or no marriage, decline in fertility, emigration and marrying outside the community. Other speakers on the occasion included minister of state for Minority Affairs Ninong Ering, Dr Lalit K. Panwar, secretary, Minority Affairs, R. C. M. Reddy chief executive officer of IL&FS Skill Development Corporation and Y. P. Singh, joint secretary in the ministry. The vote of thanks by Anurag Bajpai, director (skills) was followed by high tea.
Dr Shernaz Cama, founder director of Parzor informed TOI that "about seven percent of the funds will be spent for counseling of the Parsi youth and their families for early marriage, conceiving at the right time and training volunteers. The rest will be spent on detection and fertility treatment for married couples.” The GoI is very keen to preserve the Parsis, and hence this initiative, which had been actively lobbied for by Cama.
"The Parsi mindset of having no child or only one child needs to be replaced by a bolder stand of having two to three children,” said program director Dr Zinobia Madan, Bombay based consultant in lifestyle medicine, as quoted in TOI. Speaking to Parsiana over the telephone, Madan revealed that the scheme would concentrate on counseling first, with medical intervention by a panel of doctors at a later stage in major cities like Bombay, in Gujarat and Delhi followed by cities like Nagpur, Poona and Hyderabad which are hubs of Parsi settlement. The focus would be on young adults, creating awareness about the problem as well as preventive measures. Two volunteers in Bombay and two others for centers outside the metro would spread the word by way of pamphlets and other awareness creating literature, she revealed.
The Parsis, who numbered 69,000 during the last census (figures for the 2011 census are not yet available) are heading for extinction and measures like this one are an attempt to salvage the community with its distinctive religion and culture, wrote Vanishka Singh of the Delhi School of Economics on the CoolAge website on September 27, 2013.
"This is a small step to pay our debt to the Parsi community for their contribution to the country. We cannot afford to lose this community,” stated minister of Minority Affairs K. Rahman Khan at the launch. Several reasons for the shrinking numbers have been listed by studies conducted by the National Commission for Minorities as well as the Parzor Foundation and Tata Institute of Social Sciences, mentioned a report in The Times of India (TOI) on September 24, 2013. These include late or no marriage, decline in fertility, emigration and marrying outside the community. Other speakers on the occasion included minister of state for Minority Affairs Ninong Ering, Dr Lalit K. Panwar, secretary, Minority Affairs, R. C. M. Reddy chief executive officer of IL&FS Skill Development Corporation and Y. P. Singh, joint secretary in the ministry. The vote of thanks by Anurag Bajpai, director (skills) was followed by high tea.
Dr Shernaz Cama, founder director of Parzor informed TOI that "about seven percent of the funds will be spent for counseling of the Parsi youth and their families for early marriage, conceiving at the right time and training volunteers. The rest will be spent on detection and fertility treatment for married couples.” The GoI is very keen to preserve the Parsis, and hence this initiative, which had been actively lobbied for by Cama.
"The Parsi mindset of having no child or only one child needs to be replaced by a bolder stand of having two to three children,” said program director Dr Zinobia Madan, Bombay based consultant in lifestyle medicine, as quoted in TOI. Speaking to Parsiana over the telephone, Madan revealed that the scheme would concentrate on counseling first, with medical intervention by a panel of doctors at a later stage in major cities like Bombay, in Gujarat and Delhi followed by cities like Nagpur, Poona and Hyderabad which are hubs of Parsi settlement. The focus would be on young adults, creating awareness about the problem as well as preventive measures. Two volunteers in Bombay and two others for centers outside the metro would spread the word by way of pamphlets and other awareness creating literature, she revealed.
The Parsis, who numbered 69,000 during the last census (figures for the 2011 census are not yet available) are heading for extinction and measures like this one are an attempt to salvage the community with its distinctive religion and culture, wrote Vanishka Singh of the Delhi School of Economics on the CoolAge website on September 27, 2013.
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