Use of community schedule for rapid appraisal of Family Welfare Programme: is the approach accurate and feasible?

Both community-level and household-level data were collected for 267 communities and 5448 households in the Indian states of Uttar Pradesh Gujarat and Maharashtra. Multi-stage sampling was used: 20 randomly selected households were interviewed in 91.8% of the sample villages. Household questionnaires collected information on health fertility and family planning; community questionnaire on socioeconomic demographic conditions and health services; and separate questionnaires addressed large castes or religious groups in 160 villages and 2000 households. 3) other opinion leaders (teachers social workers caste/religious leaders); 4) common persons; and 5) health staff personnel. The community data were compared to household data regarding: a) percentage of households having electricity; b) percentage of households using a modern family planning method; c) female age at marriage; d) adult female labor force; and e) ideal number of sons. Information on electricity status was available for 267 villages and 5420 households ; the other 4 variables for 160 villages 350 caste/religious groups and 2000 households. The village electricity-use electrification rate based on the community and household surveys were 28.6% vs. 30.1%. The community and household survey estimates for couples using family planning were 41.8% vs. 39.1%. Information on female age at marriage was collected in group interviews for caste Hindus scheduled caste Hindus scheduled tribe Hindus and Muslims for 139 97 18 and 33 villages respectively. Community informants indicated female age at marriage as 17.7 years which differed from the household survey estimate of 16.5 (statistically significant). In the household survey 90% of female respondents considered the ideal number of sons 2.0 which standard also applied to all castes religious groups and all age groups. The community data revealed the ideal average number of sons as 2.6 vs. 2.0 per the household data a significant difference. According to the household survey data 23.1% of sample women worked for case while the community survey data showed significantly higher female labor force rates.