In the last decade, several international and national movements have focused their attention, on the long neglected areas of women's reproductive health.

While the world's major killer disease, smallpox, that used to claim millions of lives has been eliminated, the planet has been struck with a more dreaded disease, AIDS or Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome.

The drive for a rapid development in the education of women came largely from a perception summed up aptly in .the following statement by Mayhew: "women

There is a growing recognition that gynaecological morbidity is an important health problem among poor women in India.