The Vanishing Daughters of India

The land of former Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi is killing its daughters by the millions. Economically resurgent India is witnessing a rapid unfolding of a female genocide in the making across all castes and classes, including the upper caste rich and the educated. The situation is particularly alarming among upper-caste Hindus in some of the urban areas of Punjab, Rajasthan, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, specially in parts of Punjab, where there are only 300 girls for every 1,000 boys, according to Laura Turquet, ActionAid's women's rights policy official.

ActionAid collaborated with Canada's International Development Research Center (IDRC) to conduct research and produced a report called "Disappearing Daughters".

The report cites findings from sites across five states in north and northwest India reveal that the sex ratio of girls to boys has not only worsened but is accelerating compared to the last national census in 2001. One of the reasons for this accelerated rate of female feticide is the abuse of ultrasound technology to determine the gender of the unborn. The purveyors of the ultrasound business in every city, town and village of India entice parents by telling them to "spend 500 rupees now and save 50,000 rupees later.” The cost of the ultrasound scan is Rs. 500 and the required dowry for marrying daughters off exceeds Rs. 50,000.00.

And everywhere else, with the exception of Rajasthan, already low figures are continuing to slide. Even in Rajasthan, the proportion of girls is well below what should be the norm of around 950 girls born for every 1000 boys.

ActionAid has also found that girls are more likely to be born but less likely to survive in areas with more limited access to public health services and modern ultrasound technology. In rural Morena and Dhaulpur, deliberate neglect of girls, including allowing the umbilical cord to become infected, is used as a way to dispose of unwanted daughters.

Such neglect ensures fewer surviving daughters, with the best chances of being born and surviving as a girl depending on the birth order in your family.

All survey sites showed a decline in the proportion of girls among second-born children. And in three of the survey sites, for every 1000 third-born boys, there were fewer than 750 girls.

The problem of female infanticide is not just limited to the states in Northern India. In the southern state of Tamil Nadu, female infanticide is so frequent that all second daughters are known as "the girl born for the burial pit", according to a documentary produced by ABC Australia.

The Indian diaspora is not immune from the cultural bias against female children, either. The male-female ratios of British Indians are also getting increasingly skewed in favor of male children. Since the 1970s, the at-birth male-female ratio of British Indians has dramatically change from 103:100 to 114.4:100, excluding the birth of the first or the second child.

Here are the latest statistics from the CIA's The World Factbook on male-female ratios in India and Pakistan:

India at birth: 1.12 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.1 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 1.06 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.9 male(s)/female
total population: 1.06 male(s)/female (2009 est.)

Pakistan at birth: 1.05 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.06 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 1.05 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.88 male(s)/female
total population: 1.04 male(s)/female (2009 est.)

China at birth: 1.1 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.13 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 1.06 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.91 male(s)/female
total population: 1.06 male(s)/female (2009 est.)

The at-birth male-female ratios in Pakistan are comparable to most of the rest of the world, including the West, but the Indian ratios are the worst in the world. In spite of China's one child policy, the ratios in China are better than India's.

India Prime Minister Mr. Manmohan Singh, who has three daughters, has recognized the accelerating horror of female genocide in India. In response, he has launched the “Save the Girl Child” campaign. He has said that no nation could claim to be part of a civilized world if it condoned female feticide. An estimated 50 million girls have been sacrificed because of son preference.

"Census figures illustrate that in some of the richer states the problem is most acute. These states include Punjab which had only 798 girls (per 1,000 boys), Haryana 819, Delhi 868 and Gujarat 883 girls in the 2001 Census. Growing economic prosperity and education levels have not led to a corresponding mitigation in this acute problem," he said.

"Female illiteracy, obscurantist social practices like child marriage or early marriage, dowry, poor nutritional entitlements, taboos on women in public places make Indian women vulnerable. The patriarchal mindset and preference for male children is compounded by unethical conduct on the part of some medical practitioners," Mr. Singh said.

When the facts of this tragedy are brought up, many defensive Indians offer the examples of famous Indian women like Indra Nooyi, Kalpana Chawla, Saina Nehwal, Kalpana Morparia, Sunita Williams and Naina Lal, and ask how India is still able to produce such women of accomplishment with growing female infanticides. Instead of looking at the accomplished middle-aged Indian women, Indians should compare the at-birth male-female ratios and worry about the fact that India is now killing future Indra Nooyis.

If this female genocide continues unabated, India's male-female ratio will be so badly skewed in a decade or two that girls' families will start demanding dowry to marry off their daughters, representing a fundamental shift in the balance of power. And the contributions of the well-educated and economically string girls will earn new respect by the male-dominated Indian society.

The first step toward correcting a problem is to acknowledge it, as India's prime minister has done. But legislation alone will not help. As early as 1795, female infanticide was declared murder by the initiative of John Duncan, the British East India Company's resident in Benares, according to Dharma Kumar. But the enforcement has been extremely difficult. The key is to couple stricter enforcement with grassroots education effort to change Indian society.

My sincere hope is that men of honor and goodwill such as Manmohan Singh will step up their national campaign to stop this ongoing female genocide in India before it's too late.
Riaz Haq
www.riazhaq.com
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