THE CRIME OF FEMALE FOETICIDE - MURDER IN THE WOMB

“There was a small girl, and she knew not a word, of the language she heard, and her
fear you just could not ignore.” J.W. Turner

The missing of a girl child, the discrimination meted out to her and the denial of her
basic rights is an issue of paramount concern and urgent action. India as a country
reveres more goddesses than any other in the world. Even when female infanticide occurs
right in front of our eyes, we stand mute and indifferent. We say ‘Vande Mataram’, we
award movies like Mother India, but when it comes to having a girl child, even some of
the richest couples refrain from doing so. It is really tough being a girl in a man’s world
in India because her very right to live or be born is not granted to you.

Death is a tragedy in whatever form, at whatever time and in whatever way it lays its
hands. As Amartya Sen writes in his ‘Argumentative Indian’, “the biggest crime begins
against women, at the place where they are meant to be the safest, in their mother’s
wombs”. Female foeticide is a pitiable and inimitable form of violence against women.
Femicide i.e killing of females, in modern times, has presented in its ugliest shape as
female feticide. The twin pressures of ‘Family Planning’ and ‘Dowry’ have brought the
magnitude of female foeticide1 to such shameful proportion that sex ratio has been
declining fast in India; more so in the state of Punjab and Union Territory of Chandigarh.
Census statistics are the surface indicators of deep rooted gender bias. Many people find
themselves caught in the abortion bind.

The extremely skewed sex ratio in India—not just in one small part of the country but in
virtually every part—tells a story ... a story of the "girl deficit" caused by banned
practices undertaken by people of different religions, social strata and education levels.
With technology comes access, and when that technology penetrates the heartlands of
poverty, indigent people have found ways of using it to their advantage—or at least the
perceived "advantages" of rearing a boy as opposed to a girl child. With female fetuses

1
Referred to in other countries specially South-east jurisdictions as “Spontaneous abortions”
selectively aborted at the rate of 500,000 a year, today India has a skewed sex ratio of
933 females for every one thousand men, according to the 2001 census2. So many female
foetuses are illegally aborted that baby boys now hugely outnumber baby girls, while a
government minister has begged parents to abandon their children rather than kill them
And within each community, nationality and class, the burden of hardship often falls
disproportionately on women.3

GRAPH I : SEX RATIO PER THOUSAND MALES IN INDIA

A son’s birth is likened to “a sunrise in the abode of God”, “a feather in one’s cap” etc.
while a daughter’s birth has been equated to “watering a plant of other’s garden”. Indian
mindset believes that they will only be able to achieve ‘Moksha’ through their sons.
Manu Smriti states, “a man can gain both worlds through a son and gains eternity
through a grandson” The word ‘abortion’ has been derived from ‘abortus’ which means
“to take away” and truly, the practice takes away the wholeness of a woman who resorts
to taking away the life of her own unborn child. Medical advancements have created, by
default, a win-win SITUATION for all the perpetrators of female feticide4.

2
Planning Commission (2002) National Human Development Report 2001, Government of India, New
Delhi. Census of India, 2001
3
“Sex-ratio imbalance in Asia: Trends, consequences and policy responses” Christophe Z Guilmoto
LPED/IRD, Paris.
4
Skewed sex ratio & low aneuploidy in recurrent early missed abortion Ashutosh Halder & Ashish
Fauzdar, Department of Reproductive Biology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India
April 6, 2005
With the mobile ultrasound machines moving freely around the countryside, it would just
be a matter of time before rural India catches up with its urban counter part in the race “to
do away with the unborn girl child”. Medical technology has added a new dimension to
the induced abortion debate: gender bias. The boards displayed in nursing homes that
“Sex determination tests are not conducted here” is just a ploy to hoodwink the
authorities. The reports of recovery of female fetuses from drains, garbage dumps, public
lavatories etc. have created shock and public outrage in the state.

While already accessible to the elite since its advent, over 20 years later ultrasound
technology continues to be the most important, accessible and cheapest medical marvel
for practitioners of sex selective abortion. According to the same census, districts with
the worst child sex ratio were all in Punjab and Haryana (two of India's wealthiest states),
where a quarter of the female population is believed to have disappeared and the sex ratio
could now be even as low as 500 or 600 females to 1,000 males. Things are not that rosy
in the capital of the country either5.

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. Recently, the Sikh religious leaders and top
government officials participated in a “Oath taking” ceremony as a gesture for the
commitment to the cause of unborn girl child6. Last year, in a series of reports entitled
“Kokh Me Katl”, or Murder in the Womb, two journalists working for India's Sahara
Samay television channel found 100 doctors, in both private and government hospitals,
who were prepared to perform illegal terminations of girl foetuses. In the grainy TV
pictures, doctors from four states and 36 cities talked with chilling casualness about how
to dump the remains. Many weren't bothered about the foetus's age, just that it was a girl
that could be got rid off. The average cost of the procedure was a few thousand rupees
(around £30).

5
“Skewed Sex Ratio In Punjab-A Demographic Catastrophe” Singh D, Kumar A, Vij K,
Department of Forensic Medicine, Govt. Medical College, Sector 32, Chandigarh AND Rao R.
“Missing Girls of Punjab”. Social Welfare. March 2004;37-38.
6
Krishna Kumari DB, Vani C. Media for Gender Empowerment. Social Welfare. Oct.2004; 37-40 AND
Mallick A. “India's Missing Women”. Social Welfare. July 2004; 4-10
Although ministers in India have woken up to "a national crisis", the response has been to
condone the abandonment of female babies. "lf you don't want a girl, leave her to us,"
Renuka Chowdhury, India's minister of state for women and child development, said
recently. “The government will bring up your children. Don't kill them". The
REASONS noteworthy for this dreadful trend are manifolds. The shortage of women has
in no way increased their value, simply because they are a "scarce commodity." It merely
translates into stricter controls and greater restrictions placed over them. And as this acute
gender imbalance is causing real social problems, many are resorting to "buying" girls
from poorer communities beyond their region.

Unchecked female infanticide and sex-selective abortions have so radically upset the
balance that as women get increasingly outnumbered in these communities, the level and
extent of exploitation—sexual, physical and mental—deepens, severely damaging their
health and placing them at risk for HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections7.

The inhabitants of Punjab, who pioneered the green revolution in the last century, are
now heading for a devastating economic and social fall out in the near future due to
sharply declining (882 in 1991; 874 in 2001) sex ratio. The reasons of ‘son-mania’ are
socio-cultural, economic and political ones. Among others, the predominant cause is the
agrarian set-up associated with the ownership of land and the social infrastructure
sustained by Punjabi’s that accords a low status to women8 The present scenario in
Punjab is worse and the situation of the sex ratio is absolutely skewed and pitiable.

Chandigarh, the beautiful City has the dubious distinction of having the lowest sex
ratio (773) in whole of the country despite its high literacy rate of 81.76%.9 The
worst affected districts of Punjab are Ludhiana (824), Fatehgarh Sahib (851) and Patiala
(864)(Graph III). With 11.4% increase in literacy rate during the last decade (58.5% in
7
Rath, R.M., and Mishra A.K. (2005). “Techniques for Sex Ratio Analysis”. Association of Professional
Geographers
8
Khosa A. “Minority panel wants jathedars to fight foeticide”, The Indian Express 29 Sept.2004. Available
from http://www.indianexpress.com/
AND Newkerala.com. Punjab agrarian setting behind Sikhs 'dismal sex ratio'. 2004. Available from
http://athens-olympics-2004.newkerala.com/index.php?action 30651. ALSO, supra Note 5
9
International Family Planning Perspectives Volume 32, Number 2, June 2006, DIGEST
1991; 69.95% in 2001), The juvenile sex ratio of 793 compared to overall sex ratio of 874
is a cause of concern in one of the most prosperous states of India10. Two third (66.1
percent) of the total population resides in rural areas and the remaining one third (33.9
percent) in urban areas. The adverse sex ratio is the main cause of concern in
demography of the Punjab State. As per 2001 census, there were 876 females per 1000
of males in Punjab as compared to 933 females at the all India level as per 2001 census.
This adverse trend in the sex ratio is mainly attributed to female foeticide and infanticide.
although the sex ratio of Punjab State had conventionally been significantly lower than
all India throughout the last century yet it had been improving since 1911 to 1991. But it
declined in 2001, which should be taken a cause of concern both for the Govt. and
society. The national average was 933. In fact, the sex ratio of Punjab has never gone
above the national average. According to the 2001 census, the worst sex ratio in any state
was Haryana’s. What is shocking is that at the time of Independence the sex ratio stood at
a healthy 946, but over the last 60 years it has fallen to 933. Thus, instead of improving it
is becoming worse.11

GRAPH III : DISTRIBUTION OF SEX RATIO IN DISTRICTS (PUNJAB & HARYANA)

10
Ibid, Note 9
11
Ibid Note 9 ; also supra Note 5
No one has any Quick-Fix Answers so deeply held and pervasive prejudices against
women. The question for India is whether girls like Bhavia, that abandoned and
unwanted bundle lying in a Delhi orphanage, will have choices that her own mother
never did12. In districts, where the sex ratio is really poor, the government will be offering
cash incentives to families that have a girl child. Every newborn girl who has been
registered will be given Rs 5000. And this won’t be the end of the largesse, at various
stages of her education also, she will be given incentives. This scheme may work for the
poor, but alas! Illegal sex determination happens among the affluent as well. This is
where one believes the society needs to make a change. Some of the richest couples in
Punjab and Haryana are guilty of killing their girl children. This is the mindset of the
people, which only we can change. A recent survey revealed that female foeticide was
highest among women with university degrees.

The government has also thought of chipping in by trying to bridge the gap between the
two sexes in parts of Punjab and Haryana with the Conditional Cash Transfer Scheme as
it is followed in many other Latin American and Central American countries. Exemplary
punishment should be given to the doctors who aid/indulge in this heinous practice of
conducting sex determination tests (14). Such doctors should be punished by MCI under
the offence of “Professional Misconduct. Under Indian law, however, doctors who use
"sonography" are forbidden to tell mothers the sex of the child.

The Eleventh Five Year Plan has already provided Rs 9.11 crore to benefit 99,000
girls in the current year under the scheme.

As the chances of a prompt self-correction of the current sex-ratio distortions are slim,
affected societies should amplify and diversify their responses in the coming years. The
regulation of sex-selective abortions is obviously a strategy bound to yield results, if
implemented vigorously. The first aspect is to monitor technology supply and its change.
But, of course, strict regulation of sex-determination procedures and the prohibition of
sex-selective abortions are necessary ingredients to change the overall landscape.

12
Supra Note 6
Another approach to reducing sex-ration imbalances has been the efforts, by
governments and non-governmental organisations, to work through advocacy,
sensitisation and awareness-raising programmes.13 By targeting special groups, such as
health personnel, young women and students, such campaigns aim to change people’s
mindsets and attitudes towards girls, for instance, by showcasing women’s successes and
their contributions to their birth family. If effectively enforced, such laws could well
allow women to gradually claim a larger role in family decisions and management.

A different approach – beyond advocacy, repressive measures and the impact of social
change – consists of focusing on the demand side, in order to counterbalance the effect of
women’s undervaluation in patriarchal systems. These systems may take very different
forms in each country, and there is therefore no common strategy. As such, this approach
consists of launching preferential policies towards girls. At the same time, while such
policies may seem like sound ways by which to offset the impact of economic
undervaluation of girls, they are at times neither feasible nor affordable.

With hundreds of thousands of female foetuses aborted every year in Asia, coupled with
the prospects of deep social tensions in the future, countries in the region now have the
duty to launch a head-on campaign against sex-selective abortions, one of the most
upsetting manifestations of gender-based violence recognised by the 1995 Beijing
Platform for Action14. The past decades, which have seen greater attention to and some
progress made towards women’s empowerment, should not lead to their demographic
marginalisation in Asia.15 The time to act has come, as decisions and initiatives taken
today will shape the Asian society in which young generations will live tomorrow.16

13
“How to stop female foeticide”. The Tribune 2004 November 01.
14
Ravindra R.P. “Refined techniques of Femicide, foetal sex determination and sex pre-selection/technical
aspects”, Harvard Law Review..; Coale, Ansley J. (1996). "Five Decades of Missing Females in China"
Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 140 (4): 421-
450( edu/Organizations/healthnet/SAsia/suchana/9999/femcide.html)
15
Coale, Ansley J. (1996). "Five Decades of Missing Females in China" Proceedings of the American
Philosophical Society 140 (4): 421-450.
16
"Sex-ratio imbalance in Asia - Trends, consequences and policy responses". United Nation Population
Fund.
http://www.unfpa.org/gender/docs/studies/summaries/regional_analysis.pdf( 2008-12-15)
At the 4th International Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, India was pivotal in
calling for making the meeting a Conference of "commitments" and was the first to set
out its own commitment to specific targets of reduction in gender inequality17. The
pledge to eradicate poverty and ensure equality of opportunity to all finds further
expression in the active role India has played in shaping the agenda of major international
conventions and conferences. India has played a significant and substantive role in the
debates and discussions leading up to many of the major world conferences and
conventions.
“From woman man is born; within woman man is conceived; to woman he is engaged
and married; women becomes his friend; when his women dies, he seeks another woman;
to woman he is bound. So why call her bad ? From her kings are born.”

We should not wait for social transformation to take care of this burning issue. We may
be paving way for more hazardous technologies that may have more catastrophic results.
There is URGENT NEED to change the mindset of people. The millennium development
goals of gender equality and the empowerment of common should be on top priority.
Last, but not the least, everyone should imbibe the divine revelation received by Guru
Nanak and preached to all his followers: India’s missing women cannot be brought back
to life but the future generations of women can be protected if we take the campaign
against female feticide on a war footing.

India's paradox is that prosperity has not meant progress. Development has not erased
traditional values: in fact, selective abortion has been accelerated in a globalising India.
On the one hand there has been new money and an awareness of family planning - so
family sizes get smaller. But wealthier - and better- educated - Indians still want sons.

By SHASHWAT BAJPAI

17
Hamilton, W.D. (1967). “Extraordinary sex ratios”, Science 156: 477-488. JSTOR ; supra, Note 16,