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Does it Pay to Deliver? An Evaluation of India’s Safe Motherhood Program

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  • Joshi, Shareen
  • Sivaram, Anusuya

Abstract

The paper evaluates an Indian maternal conditional cash transfer scheme. Launched in 2005, the program gives women cash transfers for receiving maternal and child health care services. Data are drawn from India’s District Level Household Survey to evaluate the program’s impact. Results indicate that the program had a limited overall effect: relative to the broader population, the targeted population experienced a 3 percentage point increase in medically supervised births, but no increase in ante-natal or post-natal care. We do however, find evidence of heterogeneity of impact. Women without any formal education and women in rural areas experience disproportionate gains.

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  • Joshi, Shareen & Sivaram, Anusuya, 2014. "Does it Pay to Deliver? An Evaluation of India’s Safe Motherhood Program," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 434-447.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:64:y:2014:i:c:p:434-447
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.06.004
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    2. Forman-Rabinovici, Aliza & Sommer, Udi, 2018. "An impediment to gender Equality?: Religion’s influence on development and reproductive policy," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 48-58.
    3. J. Krishna Nair & Pulak Mishra, 2025. "Demand side financing for promoting institutional delivery: experiences of Janani Suraksha Yojana in Indian states," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 245-270, June.
    4. Benjamin M Hunter & Sean Harrison & Anayda Portela & Debra Bick, 2017. "The effects of cash transfers and vouchers on the use and quality of maternity care services: A systematic review," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(3), pages 1-37, March.
    5. Harsh Malhotra, 2022. "Why Healthcare CCTs may not Improve Children's Health:Insights from India's Janani Suraksha Yojana," Working papers 321, Centre for Development Economics, Delhi School of Economics.
    6. Aizawa, T.;, 2019. "Reviewing the Existing Evidence of the Conditional Cash Transfer in India through the Partial Identification Approach," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 19/24, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    7. Cooper, Jan E. & Benmarhnia, Tarik & Koski, Alissa & King, Nicholas B., 2020. "Cash transfer programs have differential effects on health: A review of the literature from low and middle-income countries," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 247(C).
    8. Anaka Aiyar & Naveen Sunder, 2024. "Health insurance and child mortality: Evidence from India," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(5), pages 870-893, May.
    9. Prabhat Kishore & Pratap S. Birthal, 2024. "The impact of direct benefit transfers for micro-irrigation on farm performance: Evidence from India," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 26(7), pages 17995-18015, July.
    10. Susmita Baulia, 2020. "Cash incentives to mothers or to community health workers - what contributes better to the health of the mother and the newborn? Evidence from India," Discussion Papers 133, Aboa Centre for Economics.
    11. Vedavati Patwardhan, 2023. "The impact of the Mamata conditional cash transfer program on child nutrition in Odisha, India," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(9), pages 2127-2146, September.
    12. Somdeep Chatterjee & Prashant Poddar, 2021. "From Safe Motherhood to Cognitive Ability: Exploring Intrahousehold and Intergenerational Spillovers," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(352), pages 1075-1106, October.

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