Seventy-eight symptomatic females without palpable breast lumps were subjected to bilateral four quadrant fine needle aspiration cytology. Cytological evidence of an epithelial proliferative lesion was seen in 44 of these cases. Based on the cytological evidence of proliferation, the site for open biopsy was determined. Histopathological study of the breast biopsies in these patients showed proliferative disease without atypia (PDWA) in 40 cases, atypical ductal hyperplasia (ADH) in two, atypical lobular hyperplasia (ALH) in one and ADH with ALH in one case. Cytology was thus useful in establishing the presence of proliferative activity, commenting on the extent of proliferation, and thereby roughly mapping out the area of the breast most suitable for biopsy. On cytological grounds, it was not possible to distinguish the atypical hyperplastic lesions from the proliferative diseases without atypia.