Lifestyle of fishermen in Tamil Nadu The fishermen of Tamil Nadu are locally known as 'pattanavars' (literally, a dweller a town or pattanam, which word occurs in the names of various towns

Indian society consists of immensely varied political, social, ethnic, linguistic, religious and community groups, which, by and large, reside in villages, where poverty, misconceived religious notions, social customs, illiteracy, ignorance and superstitions prevail. The Government of India launched a family welfare programme in the early 1950's to accelerate the country's economic and social development, and has formulated an official policy with the aim of reducing the rate of population growth. The programme was accorded special priority during the 1960s and 1970s, but has so far only met with marginal success, that is, till 1989-90, only 41.9 percent of the total eligible couples had been effectively protected [1] and the target of reducing the birth rate from 40 to 25 per thousand population by 1991 remained only a pious wish. A possible reason for this is that a uniform policy is being followed for the entire country with an emphasis on permanent methods without considering the needs and preferences of the local people. For example, in Goa and other places a considerable percentage of women successfully use natural family planning methods, which are not included in the list of official family planning methods [2].