Indians kill 2,000 girls every day, they prefer sons, says minister

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It's a girl: The three deadliest words in India
It’s a girl: The three deadliest words in India
Two thousand girls are “killed” every day due to a preference for sons in India with most aborted or murdered just after birth, the country’s minister for women and child development said.

Despite laws that ban parents having tests to determine the gender of unborn children, sex selective abortions remain a common practice in parts of India, and have resulted in a decline in the number of girls compared to boys.

“You have 2,000 girls who are killed in the womb every day. Some are born and have pillows on their faces choking them,” Maneka Gandhi told NDTV news channel late on Monday.

India’s 2011 census showed that while the overall female-to-male ratio has improved marginally since the last census a decade ago, fewer girls were born than boys and the number of girls younger than six plummeted for the fifth straight decade.

A May 2011 study in British medical journal The Lancet found that up to 12 million Indian girls were aborted over the last three decades, resulting in a skewed child sex ratio of 918 girls to every 1,000 boys in 2011, versus 962 in 1981.

India’s traditionally male-dominated culture views sons as assets — breadwinners who will provide for the family, carry on the family name, and perform the last rites for their parents, an important ritual in many faiths.

Girls, however, are often seen as a liability, with families having to dig deep for a substantial dowry to ensure a desirable match. In a culture that views pre-marital sex as bringing shame to the girl’s family, parents also worry about their safety.

Gandhi said that the government’s “Beti Bachao Beti Padhao” (Save the Daughter, Educate the Daughter) campaign, which aims to reverse the declining number of girls, had already shown results since its launch in January.

The initiative, which is being run in 100 districts where the ratio of girls to boys is particularly low, aims to better enforce laws that criminalize pre-birth gender selection and improve girls’ access to education.

“We didn’t expect results to show for at least a year or two years, if at all, as it’s one of those mindset change things,” Gandhi said in her first television interview since taking office in May last year.

She added that the campaign had led to an increase in unwanted girl infants ending up in orphanages but said this was a positive response as it meant they had moved “from being killed to being thrown out”.

“The result is that hundreds of girl children are being thrown into orphanages in these 100 districts. In Amritsar, they have received 89 girls this month. In Tamil Nadu, they said the same thing. In all the districts we have chosen, they have a lot of girls going into palnas (state orphanages),” the minister said.
Reuters

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5 responses to “Indians kill 2,000 girls every day, they prefer sons, says minister”

  1. arzatna1 Avatar

    One of these girls could be another Indira Gandhi.
    Shame on you India for allowing this to happen !!

    1. 5thDrawer Avatar
      5thDrawer

      As long as the state supports the orphanages, it’s an improvement. They receive an education … which means that 100 years from now, some will be keeping their daughters … and that’s assuming they stay there to change the society, of course.

  2. arzatna1 Avatar

    We live in a funny world
    In India they kill their girls and those that remain alive have to buy the men they want to marry .
    In the Muslim World men have to save all their life to afford the woman they want to marry .
    Beheading of men takes place at a later stage
    There must be a better way

    1. 5thDrawer Avatar
      5thDrawer

      LOL ….
      And the Talibanis throw acid in the faces of those they keep, to prevent them from learning anything.
      (And even with those numbers, they are catching up to China on population…)

  3. 5thDrawer Avatar
    5thDrawer

    “Female chimpanzees put males to shame when it comes to tool use.”

    But check out Black Holes first….. Radio programme .. 17 mins … same link.
    http://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/this-week-a-black-hole-in-physics-1.2849919

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