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Sun, 14/03/2010 - 08:00
Submitted by Reena Daruwalla on Tue, 09/06/2009 - 11:22
What is it about the Indian mentality that makes people conveniently consign the female sex to the ‘Devi’ category and disembody her to the extent that rampant female foeticide (abortion of the female foetus by sex determination) is a grim and ineluctable reality of life?
The fact is; and this is still very much a depressing reality that boys are desirable because they fetch the dowry rather than need it to be paid. Besides it is the boy that carries forward the ‘name of the family’ the ‘Vansh’. Therefore a ‘Boy is a Must’, and try convincing the believers otherwise. These are not antiquated, obsolete ideas but those which very much have currency in present times, and considered practical wisdom rather than pernicious thought detrimental to society as a whole.
It is a nationwide phenomenon, or should I say nationwide shame that the girl foetus is routinely aborted in the quest for the all important ‘male heir’, but what is really disquieting is that Delhi’s sex ratio is even more skewed than the national ratio. The national sex ratio is 927 girls to every 1000 boys, but in Delhi that number is just 865 girls to every 1000 boys.
This is a shocking statistic, and many will sagely shake their heads in supposed dismay; however it is the affluent, the supposedly educated who indulge in this crime. Though outlawed, the practice is wide spread in hospitals across Delhi with the problem being as wide spread in Punjab and Chandigarh, which are the other areas with the worst sex ratios.
Studies have proposed that it isn’t just the problem of difficulties for men seeking brides that is the outcome of this heinous practice, many other problems could also result: according to one study, “it has been seen that populations with more number of males remain at risk of social unrest with increase in crime and violence against women like dowry death, child marriage, bride selling, kidnapping, rape etc.”
And this is not just some statistic that males outnumber females in Delhi; this skewed sex ratio is making itself in schools, with boys outnumbering girls in preschool nurseries and junior schools. In older classes it is other reasons why the boys outnumber girls: there is still the mindset that it is the boy’s education that is to get priority; the girl is to be married off anyway. There is also of course the belief that educating girls gives them too many ideas (read options for independence) and that it is best to have them married off early so that they ‘adjust’ to the boy’s family without problems.
It is dismally sad that we need to consider the fact that female foeticide is at least better than female infanticide (females being killed at birth in a variety of barbaric methods), abandonment or the chronic neglect of the girl child who is spared. Only a very substantial change in mindset and social outlook can help us overcome this social evil.
Sex Ratio Figures and more statistics at: http://74.125.153.132/search?q=cache:0IQeW9D91UkJ:health.delhigovt.nic.in/Family/Delhi_Scenario.DOC+delhi+sex+ratio&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=in&lr=lang_en
Finding of study quoted from: http://www.icfmt.org/vol2no4/skewed.htm
The fact is; and this is still very much a depressing reality that boys are desirable because they fetch the dowry rather than need it to be paid. Besides it is the boy that carries forward the ‘name of the family’ the ‘Vansh’. Therefore a ‘Boy is a Must’, and try convincing the believers otherwise. These are not antiquated, obsolete ideas but those which very much have currency in present times, and considered practical wisdom rather than pernicious thought detrimental to society as a whole.
It is a nationwide phenomenon, or should I say nationwide shame that the girl foetus is routinely aborted in the quest for the all important ‘male heir’, but what is really disquieting is that Delhi’s sex ratio is even more skewed than the national ratio. The national sex ratio is 927 girls to every 1000 boys, but in Delhi that number is just 865 girls to every 1000 boys.
This is a shocking statistic, and many will sagely shake their heads in supposed dismay; however it is the affluent, the supposedly educated who indulge in this crime. Though outlawed, the practice is wide spread in hospitals across Delhi with the problem being as wide spread in Punjab and Chandigarh, which are the other areas with the worst sex ratios.
Studies have proposed that it isn’t just the problem of difficulties for men seeking brides that is the outcome of this heinous practice, many other problems could also result: according to one study, “it has been seen that populations with more number of males remain at risk of social unrest with increase in crime and violence against women like dowry death, child marriage, bride selling, kidnapping, rape etc.”
And this is not just some statistic that males outnumber females in Delhi; this skewed sex ratio is making itself in schools, with boys outnumbering girls in preschool nurseries and junior schools. In older classes it is other reasons why the boys outnumber girls: there is still the mindset that it is the boy’s education that is to get priority; the girl is to be married off anyway. There is also of course the belief that educating girls gives them too many ideas (read options for independence) and that it is best to have them married off early so that they ‘adjust’ to the boy’s family without problems.
It is dismally sad that we need to consider the fact that female foeticide is at least better than female infanticide (females being killed at birth in a variety of barbaric methods), abandonment or the chronic neglect of the girl child who is spared. Only a very substantial change in mindset and social outlook can help us overcome this social evil.
Sex Ratio Figures and more statistics at: http://74.125.153.132/search?q=cache:0IQeW9D91UkJ:health.delhigovt.nic.in/Family/Delhi_Scenario.DOC+delhi+sex+ratio&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=in&lr=lang_en
Finding of study quoted from: http://www.icfmt.org/vol2no4/skewed.htm
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