For the fear of labour pains, many ‘educated’ women are thronging hospitals to deliver babies without having to go through 10 to 12 hours of labour pain. The rough estimates suggest a sizeable chunk of  expecting mothers — as much as 20 per cent — want to go in for caesarean delivery rather than normal vaginal delivery.

Over the past five years, the gynaecologists corroborate, there has been a major shift in the way women respond to childbirth. “Today more women ask on request to have a caesarean rather than waiting for the normal delivery,” says Dr Promila Jindal, professor and unit head, department of gyaenocology, Dayanand Medical College and Hospital.

“Not only do they want to opt for caesarean for fear of labour pains, some of them also want to regulate the birth of the child on the basis of forecasts made by pandits so that the birth falls in the perfect scheme of cosmic configuration. They tell us the date and time according to either the pandits’ forecast or to match the birth date with the couple’s marriage anniversary, other birthdays in the family so that the birth of the child fits their ‘requirements’.”

“The reason why more would-be-mothers now want to avoid labour pains is because they have more awareness that the caesarean deliveries are much more safe now and provide for painless experience. The number of such requests is increasing because the peer groups discuss the pain a woman goes through during delivery and that serves as a conditioning for them to opt for caesarean,” she says.

Dr Mini Ahuja, consultant gyneacologist at Iqbal Nursing Home, says about 30 per cent of the pregnant women approaching them talk about the possibility of caesarean even though there are no complications involved. “Such queries and requests have almost doubled in the last couple of years,” she adds.