For the last three decades, India's Family Welfare Programme has pursued the goal of reducing fertility as rapidly as possible. Until recently the means used to achieve this goal were method-specific contraceptive targets and cash incentives for acceptors.

The notion of quality in the public health system is becoming increasingly an issue for policymakers and planners in India. The Eighth Five-Year Plan identified the poor quality of family welfare services as one of the factors

There is a need to document women's perceptions regarding the quality of their health care, including abortion services, since most studies to date have approached this issue from the viewpoint of service providers, policymakers, or the state (Jesani and Iyer 1995).

The Indian Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act came into force in 1972, in response to the high mortality and morbidity associated with illegal abortion. However, 25 years on, both restrictions in the law and the way it is implemented through service delivery have failed to meet the aborti

This paper presents a part of the qualitative exploratory study conducted in rural Maharashtra from April 1994 to April 1996 to understand the issue of abortion from women's perspective.