Dr Anita, who just goes by her first name, has a flourishing practice in Bihar. She is the most sought-after consulting gynecologist in a state with India’s highest fertility rate – the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime is 3.6 here. Her day is so packed that she cannot meet all her waiting patients. So she advises them on the phone, and they love her because the advice comes free.

Dr Anita is not a real person. She’s a recorded voice that, along with 40 illustrated cards on a kunji (Hindi for key ring), works as an audio-visual aid for community health workers advising families on mother and child health. The target is to bring the state’s maternal deaths down, by 2017, from 261 per 1,00,000 live births (Sample Registration System – SRS 2009) to 119, neonatal deaths from 31/1,000 (SRS 2010) to 20, infant deaths from 48 (SRS 2010) to 26, and total fertility from 3.6 to 2.9.

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