Beatrice Tozzi
Female infanticide is a phenomenon that has interested India for long time. The oldest evidence of laws against these killingsare to be traced in the years of British Raj (1858-1947).
Back in the years of colonization, was in 1870 that the British government adopted the Prevention of Murder of Female Infants Act, and only in 1898 female infanticide was acknowledged as a crime.[1]
Female foeticide is the subject of a brilliant essay, “Disappearing Daughters”, wrote by Gita Aravamudan in 2007. This essay represents a complex effortin the direction of a theoretical clarification on this subject, asking many questions and trying to provide answers.
The origins of the discrimination against girls are connected to the structure of Indian society. The caste system, a patriarchal societythat stigmatizes women and marriage dowries are, for example, some of the characteristics thatcontribute to the loss of many women’s lives each year.[2]
Who is the victim in this system? The mother? A mother could simply justify that, with the murder, she has prevented his daughter from a difficult life, just like her own. A woman interviewed by Aravamudan on this issue simply resume this to her: “better to kill her [the baby girl] before she knows this miserable life”.[3] And if we simply blame society, we will begin a round of guilt that would lead to nothing, because we know, “things have always been like this” and “so they will continue to be”.
If the society doesn’t think that women are capable of independency, the next thought is to consider them as burden. An exclusive property of men, specifically of their male family members.
This idea is passed down from generation to generation: these thoughts are internalized by both men and women.
The methods used to kill girlsare many and different. As shown byGita Aravamudan, in the area of Chandigarh, for example, “the female infant was sealed alive inside a pot with a piece of jaggery and a bit of unseen cotton”, then she was “buried in the field while her elders stood around her and chanted”.[4] In Gujarat, “mothers would drown their newborn daughters in milk”.[5]
According to the author, the phenomenon concerns both rural and urban areas. The main difference is that in the educated areas scans for sex determination are highly performedbetween future mothers, in order to first resort to abortion in the case of a female daughter. Scans that are obviously too expensive for families that live in marginalized areas.
A report from ActionAid and International Development Research Centre claim that in 2008 up to “35 million women are ‘missing’ in India”.[6] In 2020, 45 million went missing.[7]Data which is reflected into shocking gender ratio numbers.
The lack of women in some state, such as Punjab and Haryana, leads to another phenomenon: the purchase of women from other communities or tribes by men who are looking for children. Women are bought, and their families get small sumsfor the sale. Purchasing a bride is considered just another form of sale, and for this reason women are treated like household slaves, not as wives.[8]
What’s it gonna take to stop this? Build awareness in society is the first thing to do, in order to let go all the old conceptions about women and their role in society. Something that can effectivelywork are workshops, that involve students and communities in the process of understandinggender equality. Realize activities that make women understand their value, that can make them thinking that also girls must also be desired. As long as society continues to think of women as inferior and valueless individuals, capable of practically nothing, spreading awareness on gender equity will be the only tool that we could use to try to fight this epidemic.
NGOs really contribute to this cause, providing educational tools to women and communities. Heeals, for example, has been active for more than ten yearsin the field of gender equity, contributing to the campaign Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (Save Girls, Educate Girls).
[1] Disappearing Daughters: The tragedy of Female Foeticide by Gita Aravamudan, pag. 48-49
[2] https://gsdrc.org/document-library/disappearing-daughters/
[3] Disappearing Daughters, pag. 6
[4] Disappearing Daughters, pag. 52
[5] Disappearing Daughters, pag. 10
[6] ActionAid and International Development Research Centre, 2008, 'Disappearing Daughters', ActionAid, London
[7] UNFPA’s State of the World Population 2020 report
[8] Disappearing Daughters, pag. 137
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