Disappearing girl-child
2004 | by Madhu Gurung
The sex ratio, the number of females per 1,000 males, in the 0-6 age-group in India has been consistently declining over the past few decades.
| Year | All-India female/male child ratio in 0-6 age group |
|---|---|
| 1961 | 976/1,000 |
| 1971 | 964/1,000 |
| 1981 | 962/1,000 |
| 1991 | 945/1,000 |
| 2001 | 927/1,000 |
The sex ratio is most distorted in Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, which had less than 900 girls per 1,000 boys in the 0-6 age-group in 1991. In Census 2001, the sex ratio plunged further, to levels of around 800.
Sex ratios (0-6 years) in PACS Programme states (2001 Census)
| State | Sex ratio |
|---|---|
| Uttar Pradesh | 909/1,000 |
| Jharkhand | 965/1,000 |
| Chhattisgarh | 975/1,000 |
| Madhya Pradesh | 932/1,000 |
| Bihar | 942/1,000 |
| Maharashtra | 913/1,000 |
The sex ratio varies with the birth order of the girl-child. A survey done by the Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI) in two districts of Haryana and Punjab showed a sharp decline in the sex ratio from the first to the fourth child. This implied that while parents may accept a girl-child as their first child, subsequently they prefer to have a son. This also suggests that parents who go in for large families do so basically to have a son.
Some Indian communities are known to practice female infanticide, where female children are put to death at birth or immediately thereafter. In recent times, however, it is female foeticide - made possible by technological advances in pre-natal diagnostic techniques, which has been the major factor responsible for the declining sex ratio.
The burden of dowry on poor families is cited frequently as a reason for female foeticide. But poverty has little to do with female foeticide. In fact, it is prosperity, which allows improved access to medical technology, that is fuelling the trend.
Data collected by VHAI also suggests that the level of education has little to do with female foeticide. For example, even though Hoshiarpur district in Punjab has a literacy rate of 81.4%, its child sex ratio had declined in the latest census from 864 females in 1991 to 810 per 1,000 males.
Demographer Ashish Bose, said: "Prosperity ensures better infrastructure, more machines and more doctors to perform the tests. People use their money power to access clinics for sex-determination of foetuses, pay for the technology, and opt for female foeticide."
Technological advances in pre-natal diagnostic techniques, which were intended solely to detect genetic abnormalities in the foetus, have been misused to determine the sex of the foetus and undergo sex-specific abortion.
Amniocentesis has been one such misused test. It involves inserting a needle into the womb of a pregnant women to withdraw amniotic fluid to detect genetic abnormalities. It is also used to determine the sex of the foetus. Nowadays it is the non-invasive technique of ultrasonography that is most frequently used to determine the sex of the foetus.
In early-1979, North India’s first sex determination clinic was opened in Amritsar; soon similar clinics mushroomed in Punjab, Haryana, Western Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra.
Legal framework
Following protests from women’s activists, the Forum Against Sex Determination and Sex Pre-Selection was formed in Mumbai to campaign against sex-selective abortions. Public outrage against sex-determination tests and sex-specific abortions led to the enactment of the Maharashtra Regulation and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act in 1988, the first of its kind in the country.
The campaign had initially focused on the hazards of amniocentesis and chorion biopsy techniques and protested against their use in determining the sex of the foetus. Today it is focused on the use of ultrasound scans.
Under pressure from women’s rights activists and human rights groups, the central government brought in the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act in 1994. The Act, which required ratification by individual state assemblies, bans the use of pre-natal diagnostic techniques for sex-determination purposes and provides for a three- year imprisonment and fine of Rs 10,000 for offenders. Since ultrasound scans were useful in detecting a host of genetic abnormalities, the procedure could not be banned outright. The law makes it illegal for the technology to be used for sex determination purposes. But offenders were rarely booked or punished.
It was only after the Census 2001 findings showed that most parts of India have fewer females than males, that the Supreme Court directed the states to strictly enforce the PNDT Act 1994. It directed that states should:
- register all ultrasound centres and doctors owning and using these machines
- ensure that mandatory notices were put up in ultrasound clinics that sex determination tests were not allowed, and
- obtain lists of purchasers of ultrasound machines from ultrasound machine manufacturers.
A central supervisory board met, set up a technical committee, and passed the PNDT Amendment Act, changing the title of the Act to the Pre-Conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act which came into affect on February 14, 2003. The law bars the determination and disclosure of the sex of the foetus, limits use of ultrasound to the detection of genetic flaws and recognises sex selection prior to conception as a cognisable offence. The punishment amounts to three years in jail and a fine of Rs 50,000. The State Medical Council can suspend a convicted doctor and cancel his registration.
However, while laws do act as deterrents, they can do little to change the traditional mindset.
The girl-child who lives also suffers
While female foeticide sees to it that millions of girl-children are never born, several million more die because of willful neglect by their families.
Deliberate discrimination against the girl-child takes several forms:
- nutritional denial such as inadequate breastfeeding and early weaning
- insufficient or delayed medical care
- lack of attention causing emotional deprivation and insufficient investment in resources
Gender disparities in health outcomes in India are prominent and disturbing. Since their biological resilience is higher, girls begin with lower mortality rates than boys during the first month of life. But later, girls have higher mortality rates. The infant mortality rate for girls is lower than boys, at 71.1 and 74.8 respectively. But the child mortality rate (0-4 years) for girls shoots up to 36.7, compared to 24.9 for boys.
Girls also have higher levels of malnutrition that place them at higher risk of both illness and death. In a survey in 2002 carried out by Vacha, a Mumbai-based women’s resource centre, it was seen that 69% of girls between 9-13 in municipal schools in Mumbai were suffering from moderate to severe malnutrition.
The participation of girls at all stages of education has been increasing steadily through the years. However, their participation is still below 50% at all stages of education and the drop-out rate is very evident. In its latest South and East Asia Regional Report, the UNESCO Institute of Statistics says that India has the highest number of out-of-school girls in South and East Asia: almost 45% of the 28 million out-of-school girls in South and East Asia are from India
Most social scientists believe that education may well be the key to ensuring the growth, earning capacity and social acceptance of the girl-child.
