In a world where the ratio of females to males is high, India is an extreme exception to the ratio rule. For various reasons spanning centuries, the murder of the girl child in India is becoming increasingly common despite the advancements in industry and technology. Female feticide also known as sex-selective abortion is the deliberate abortion of the fetus solely due to the female sex. As numbers in research studies and population surveys demonstrate female feticide is comparable to a mass epidemic or can be compared to as grave a cause such as poverty or malnutrition. The increasing masculinization and discrimination against females due to their secondary status in the patriarchal society is primarily what contributes to the less stringent regulations in India against female feticide. The practice, although deemed illegal in India, continues amongst low-income and poverty-driven neighborhoods where the financial burden of a female is rocketing and the income potential is submerging. Additionally, due to the patriarchal nature of the Indian society, females are less desirable as they are perceived to be a property of their husbands: as child-producing machines and for laborious work in the household. A woman, in the traditional Indian society, is expected to be subordinate to her husband; treated more as a prime possession rather than a real partner. Such communities support the ideology that a woman is not desirable if she is not subservient and thus is only valued for the pleasure she can give to her husband. Besides obvious ethical implications of female feticide, practical implications such as the difficulty of Indian young men from North India having to travel all the way to the South tip of India to find a bride as well as maternal deaths are evidence of the increasing skewed sex ratio.

As more parameters of the process are being inspected, officials and researchers are coming to the conclusion that the roots of the immoral female feticide institution date back to ancient practices. These practices include giving the traditional Sanskrit blessing to a bride in which it is proclaimed that she should be the bearer of a hundred sons, or the chanting of mantras by priests in order to ‘magically’ change the female fetus into one of a male. Such preposterous traditions undermine the position of a woman in society and contribute to the strengthening of the belief that females are a burden on a family.

The decreasing female to male ratio has many attributes, however, it can most be ascribed to the inherent low status of women, particularly with the coupling of the conventional gender bias. In India, there are firm roots that foster bias, most of which come from cultural, economic, as well as religious facets. In a community where the son continues to be the only hope for “preservation” of the family name, there is an unhealthy and constant obsession with the male child. The patrilineal and patrilocal character of the Indian kinship system dictates that sons are responsible for holding their families together, whether in form of financial or emotional support. Despite the immense modern industrial revolution that has taken place in India, sons are still expected to work in the fields, provide greater income towards the family, and also look after his parents in their old age. In this light, sons are seen as a type of insurance. In the context of religion, as the majority of Indians are Hindus, they follow the firm belief that only a son is permitted to light the funeral pyre in order the spirit can reach a state of Nirvana, or salvation. All of these reasons contribute to a strong preference for sons which results in a life-endangering deprivation of daughters, which is an outcome not considered abhorrent culturally and socially.

In much of India, the practice of dowry giving and taking is common, regardless of the legality of the institution. Thus, marrying off daughters in India becomes an expense that is unbearable by most middle-class families, leading to the omission of female fetuses. Although there are marriage costs associated with the son, the birth of a female child indicates that there will be huge amounts of expenditure later in her life, due to the mandatory dowries, gifts, and financial sponsoring of the wedding that the brides’ family is socially pressured to perform. Eventually, this pressure results into the implication that daughters are a drain on the household wealth, and thus they are not economically favorable--especially for families that are financially handicapped. Due to the fact many couples desire not to have such financial burdens on their heads, most dowry compulsions force debts and poverty. For example, such fear of the daughter child is prevalent more and more as medical clinics that participate in illegal sex-determination screenings advertise the murder of the female fetus through the slogan “500 rupees now, or pay 5,000,000 later”, which indicate the costs of the abortion and dowry amounts, respectively. In most cases, dowry is pressured as it represents the gratitude of accepting the liability of a woman by the groom. This social reality does not allow women to protest against any suggestion or coercion to get the female child aborted. It is unthinkable that any woman would readily agree to be a party to the crime. The magnitude of domestic violence within Indian households not only silences several wives but also makes the subservience of a woman seem acceptable, which further champions gender partisanship.

Sophisticated sex determination techniques, such as ultrasonography and trans-vaginal sonography have allowed couples and families to access abdominal ultrasound in order to determine the sex of the child in the womb. Money, a very powerful motivator in a third world country like India, has led to many medical professionals resorting to participate in the incidences of female feticide that have caused decrease in the sex ratio as well as an increase in males having to identify themselves as unmarried, due to the lack of brides within their communities. Besides the obvious harmful implications of high mortality rates amongst mothers victim to undergoing sex-selective abortion along with the sharp incline in available male bachelors that cannot find a bride, there are deleterious ramifications that cause the nation to continue being viewed on a global scale as a third world country.

In order to deter horrendous practices such as female feticide, there are many factors that are powerful tools for mending the distorted sex ratio, encompassing the education of women and increasing literacy rates, raising the marriageable age, and implementing harsh laws and regulations to correct the bias in terms of inheritance rights. The Indian government has been successful in launching the PNDT act, which strictly bans sex-selective abortion after conception. Furthermore, it regulates the use of prenatal diagnostic techniques to only institutions that have credible and detail-oriented records regarding abortions. The law also imposes a heavy fee of 10,000 rupees to those who choose to violate it initially, and a fine of 50,000 rupees and a five-year jail term for the second offense. Such serious consequences imposed on individuals convicted are often effective in curbing the conveying of the fetus gender, nonetheless, the implementation of the law needs to be improved on by fellow citizens as well as the judicial system, as many loopholes continue to exist. Although abortion is a right over one’s body, sex-selective abortion in itself can be described as a type of female violence. Therefore, it is essential that Medical Termination Providers are vigilant in regulating their clinics. The regulations can occur through by properly examining previous abortion histories as well as family background before admitting a patient for abortion or allowing for the couple to identify the gender in order to ensure that the abortion is being performed for all proactive reasons (birth defects or abnormalities) as opposed to solely for eliminating the possibility of having a girl.

Repercussions of female feticide can already be seen through the increase in rape cases and kidnappings of women, an effect that will not subside until the government and its people take action to eliminate the orthodox foundation that family life can only run through a male figure. As a nation, India can work to make regulations more stringent and permanently eradicate dowry practices so the pillars of marriage are not based in male dominance and female subservience, but rather a structure of marriage that supports women in having bodily integrity and equality between both partners.

But frankly, I can't wait to have a girl. For me, having a girl means not only the fairy tales and dressing up--but re-creating my own childhood. I can't wait to be a mother to a beautiful young girl whose memories and firsts can be mine too. I can be what my mother was for me and have my own best friend with the cutest munchkin in the world.