S1:E2 “Paraya Dhan / पराया धन”

Introduction

Two major events took place in India in 1971. First, abortion was legalized. Second, the superhit Bollywood film ‘Paraya Dhan’ was released.[1] While neither of these events was directly related to the other, in many ways, the fact that they both occurred in the same year was an ominous coincidence.

‘Paraya dhan’ means the property of others. It is not an accounting term. Nor does it refer to a legal concept. It is what girls in India have been called for ages. The term, often used lovingly by fathers and mothers alike, is a constant reminder that a daughter is not yours forever - she must be given away eventually.[2] Daughters will get married into another family someday, and this truth is thrust to the forefront of their identity early on in their life. This paper isn’t about ‘Paraya Dhan.’ It’s about the girls who never heard that derogatory term, because they weren’t given the chance to be born.

In 2018, the Indian government declared that there were more than 63 million women ‘missing’ in India and that 2 million go ‘missing’ across age groups every year as a result of the sex selective abortion of female fetuses, disease, neglect and inadequate nutrition.[3] This report is split into four parts, each of which looks at a different aspect of this incredible tragedy.

First, I argue that the systemic elimination of females from India’s population is not a new phenomenon, but one that has persisted throughout its history as a nation. I focus on the development of sex determination technologies, arguing it was the development of these which greatly exacerbated the problem after the 1980s. Second, I argue that the consequences of India’s skewed sex ratio extend beyond just the unborn, with far reaching implications for both men and women living in India today and in the future. Third, I argue that the root cause of this problem is a combination of religious, cultural, and economic factors. Lastly, I argue that legislative and other government efforts till now have been largely unsuccessful in addressing the problem because they have not focused on shifting mindsets.

Nothing New

India has grappled with a strong preference for sons for centuries now. Infanticide is defined as the killing of a child between the age of zero and one.[4] The important distinction between feticide and infanticide is that the latter occurs after a child is born whereas the former occurs while he or she is still a fetus. Instances of female infanticide in India have been recorded as early as 1789 by British colonists. In fact, the practice was so deep-rooted in certain parts of the country that in 1817, British officials noted some clans had absolutely no female children in them at all.[5] One reported that a certain Rajput ruler allowed the first daughter in hundreds of years to live only after an intervention by a British Collector in 1845.[6] Till then, every single girl born in his clan had been murdered immediately after birth. In 1870, the British passed the Infanticide Regulation Act, outlawing the barbaric practice.[7] The legislation did little to curb the problem. The methods used to kill girls at birth varied across India and were often ritualized.[8] In rural areas, female infanticide was the most common method of sex selection for ages. This changed almost overnight in 1971, the year abortion was legalized in India.

It wasn’t just the arrival of legal abortion, but the simultaneous emergence of a variety of prenatal diagnosis techniques which drastically altered both the methods of sex selection as well as where and how often it took place.[9]These techniques are now widely considered to have been the primary cause in the rapid decrease of sex ratios and shift from female infanticide to female feticide.[10] Put simply, after 1971, you could easily kill a baby girl before she was born.

Cheaper and more easily accessible prenatal sex detection was originally intended to help families with genetic diseases related to gender, which it certainly did.[11] But the Indian medical community quickly realized there was tremendous potential for profit with another, much larger customer base: the patriarchy. Ironically, the new technology was then marketed as a solution to the problem of female infanticide and became a part of India’s national population control program. It was advertised as a blessing for women who were often forced to keep having kids until one was a boy. One of the earliest studies on the result of these techniques was carried out between 1976 and 1977, in a Delhi hospital. Out of 450 girls, 430 (96%) were aborted. All 250 boys, even those with the risk of a genetic defect, were born.[12] Another study examined a Mumbai abortion center between 1984 and 1985, and found that out of 15,914 abortions carried out after the sex of the baby had been determined, 99% of the aborted fetuses were girls.[13] Another study of the 6 largest hospitals in Mumbai in 1988 found that 7,999 of 8,000 aborted fetuses were girls. The methods used to inform families of the gender of their unborn child still required expensive equipment and highly trained staff. As a result, the effect of these technologies was felt predominantly in urban centers, amongst richer Indians who could afford this ‘luxury’. This changed in the early 1980s, when the ultrasound method arrived. It was non-invasive, easy to operate, and most importantly, extremely cheap.[14]

Over the next decade, tens of thousands of ultrasound scanners were sold across the country. While it’s true that India is a place where language, food, and culture change every 100 kilometers, a rough divide can be drawn between the North and South. Northern India is known to be a more patriarchal society, whereas Southern India is relatively more matriarchal. In the 1980s, the general sex ratio in many northern states was below 900 women for every 1000 men and close to 1000 women for states in the south. Unsurprisingly, a disproportionate number of ultrasound scanners were sold in the north.[15] Despite this initial geographic discrepancy, the technology spread quickly across the country. Medical professionals with little to no training could now take full advantage of these portable ultrasound scanners. They could load them in a van and access every single village in the country. And that’s exactly what they did.[16]Ultrasound technology arrived in most Indian villages before electricity or running water did. Billboards urged Indian couples to ““pay 500 rupees now rather than 500 000 later.”[17] This was in reference to the practice of dowry, which I argue is one of the leading causes of female feticide later on in this paper.

Even those who would have never thought of killing a baby girl after birth were now easily convinced to abort her before she was born. Ultrasound technology ushered in an era where members of any socioeconomic class could afford to know the gender of a baby before it was born and get it aborted. The mid-2000s saw the arrival of use-at-home DNA kits. With these, a simple blood sample from the fingertip of a mother in her seventh week of pregnancy could be sent back to a foreign country (usually America) by mail. Within 10 days, you would know the gender of the baby. Since then, other methods of non-invasive prenatal testing have also been developed. However, these methods are more expensive and time consuming, so ultrasound scanning remains the most widespread method of prenatal sex determination in India.

The Price We Pay

The consequences of the millions of girls who have gone missing in India can be analyzed through the effect it has had on four different stakeholders: unborn girls, pregnant women, unwanted girls who are born, and Indian society as a whole.

The Unborn

The most obvious and devastating consequence of India’s long history of female feticide is the astounding number of women who simply were not born. Some experts have referred to this as India’s ‘silent genocide.’[18] A 2006 study based on a national survey of 1.1 million Indian households found that nearly 500 000 girls are lost every year in India due to sex selective abortions. According to another study, over 10 million girls have been aborted in India in just the last 20 years.[19] Another government report stated that nearly 3 million girls were aborted between 2001 and 2011.[20] These numbers are often referred to in the media as ‘missing’ girls.

Pregnant Women

There is also tremendous pressure on Indian mothers to give birth to a baby boy. Often, these societal and familial pressures are so strong they have adverse effects on both the physical and mental health of the pregnant woman. This is especially true in orthodox, religious families, where women are forced to fast intensely during pregnancy. Other practices include taking part in various rituals and going on very specific and often unhealthy diets. All of this is done to in order to please the gods and maximize the chances of giving birth to a son.[21]

According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), India already has one of the highest rates of child marriages in the world. 47% are married before the age of 18 years, and 18% are married before they reach 15 years.[22] As the number of marriageable women declines in India, men have become even more determined to marry younger girls. Girls younger than 15 years of age are five times more likely to die in child birth than women older than 20 years of age. This is an especially scary statistic when coupled with the fact that Indian women are commonly forced to reproduce until a male child is born, even if they are ‘allowed’ to not abort girls. Repeated abortions are known to be unhealthy both physically and psychologically for women, especially young women.

Studies have shown that where sex selection occurs it is strongly influenced by the gender of the preceding child; for second births with one preceding girl the ratio is 132, and for third births with two previous girls the ratio is 139. In cases where the previous child was a boy, sex ratios are normal.[23] This highlights the increasing pressure that is put on women to abort female fetuses with every pregnancy. Keep in mind, these statistics only apply when girls are allowed to be born in the first place. Even in those cases, women are the ones who face the consequences for giving birth to an unwanted girl, despite it being a medical truth that men are responsible for the gender of human offspring. These can range from divorce, abandonment, violence, and in some cases even death.

Unwanted Girls Who Are Born

Among girls who are born, if they were unwanted, they face neglect from the moment they are born. This neglect manifests itself in a variety of ways, the most common of which are biased feeding practices, inadequate clothing during winter, and less and lower-quality health care. All of these factors have resulted in a child mortality rate that is 1.5 to 2 times higher for girls than it is for boys under the age of 4.[24]

Indian Society at Large

The societal consequences of prenatal sex determination which took place over the decades are only now starting to be seen in India. It’s important to keep in mind that any discussion of these consequences on society are at least partly speculative, because they are forward looking. Additionally, many societal consequences discussed below are probably caused by a variety of factors and therefore impossible to attribute exclusively to the shortage of women.

However, studies from around the world show that large gender imbalances lead to a host of other problems. For example, the large groups of surplus boys born in the 1980s and onwards are now reaching a marriageable age. There’s a big problem though: they don’t have anyone to marry. The girls who would have become their life partners were never born. A sex ratio of 914 girls for every 1000 boys means that over the next 15 years, this problem is only going to get worse. Over 7 million men will not be able to find a woman to marry in that time period. These men are likely to remain single and will not be starting a family. This problem will be most pronounced in the northern states of Punjab, Haryana, and Rajasthan, where sex ratios fall as low as 830.[25] To this day, certain villages in Rajasthan have not seen a female birth in decades.[26] This issue is compounded by the fact that a shortage of women allows the women who are alive to marry into families of higher socioeconomic and educational status. The women will have their pick of the lot. This means the men being left behind are likely to be both the poorest and least educated. In a society where single men are not given the same social standing and acceptance as those who are married, there is now a fast growing number of men in dire economic conditions who have no outlet for sexual energy. If that sounds like trouble, it’s because it is. There is empirical evidence showing it is.

Rape

A Thomas Reuters Foundation poll in 2018 ranked India as the most dangerous country in the world for women.[27] New Delhi is not only India’s capital, but has also become the rape capital of the world. Rates of reported rape, kidnapping, and abduction have all increased drastically in India since 2006.[28] Crimes against women have risen more sharply than other category of crime. States with some of the highest rates of crime against women, Haryana, Delhi, and Rajasthan, are also the same states that have consistently had low sex ratios over the past three decades. In contrast, one of the states with a low rate of crime against women, Tamil Nadu,  a state with one of highest sex ratios in the country.

Violent Crime

Gender has been a well established factor in determining levels of crime across the globe, especially violent crime. There have been consistent findings both inside and outside of India that a disproportionate amount of violent crime is committed by younger, unmarried, and poorer men. In a study carried out between 1980 and 1982, Indian researchers found a strong correlation between homicide rates in individual states across the country and the sex ratio in those states, even after controlling for urbanization and poverty. In fact, they noted that it wasn’t just violent crime against women which was correlated with lower sex ratios, but all violent crime.[29] An MIT study in 2004 found substantial evidence that when large groups of young, unmarried men congregate, the potential for organized aggression increases substantially. That report went as far as saying that these men are also more likely to be attracted to military and military-type organizations, which could trigger large-scale domestic and even international violence.[30]

Human Trafficking

Another disturbing trend has been the rise of prostitution across India. A 2006 study found that between 1997 and 2004, the number of sex workers in India rose from two million to three million, a 50% increase in less than ten years. Over 35% of these women had entered the sex trade before the age of 18.[31] While there has been little formal research which isolates and proves a high sex ratio to be the cause of this, it doesn’t require a huge stretch of the imagination to understand the unmet sexual desires of millions of young men are at least in part fueling this trend. There is other evidence that suggests this is true. For example, India is starting to see the large-scale trafficking of girls from southern and eastern states with relatively higher sex ratios to northern and western states, where there is a shortage of girls.[32] Concurrently, there has been a rise in violent crime in those same southern and eastern states. While official figures do not exist, several newspapers have reported on the practice of kidnapping and buying girls in the poorest of districts and selling them to richer families elsewhere.[33] Along with this atrocity, the sale is often accompanied by forced polyandry, where a girl will be made to produce sons not only for her husband, but his unmarried brothers as well. 

Why Boys?

The super strong preference for male children in India has complex religious, cultural, and economic roots which have evolved over a period of 3000 years.

Religious Reasons

Ancient Vedic texts referred to women as “saamraajini”, a queen of the household entitled to an equal share in the performance of religious rites.[34] Manu, the mythological first man and author of the first Sanskrit law code wrote, “The gods are satisfied wherever women are honored, but where they are not respected, rites and prayers are ineffectual.”[35] Unfortunately, Manu also wrote that no man or woman could secure eternal salvation if their funeral pyre was not lit by a son. Perhaps because of this, he added that a woman who only gives birth to daughters may be left in the eleventh year of marriage. In this way, the afterlife was securely tied to the birth of a male child in the family and women were given a religious duty to birth a son. Over time, it was this aspect of his writings which was given more and more weight, leading to many other rituals and practices which could only be completed by a male figure. It is an unsettling paradox that the same Hindu religion which worships countless female goddesses also has a longstanding tradition in which a newly-wed brides are blessed to be the ‘mother of a hundred sons.’[36] Religious tradition also dictates that during pregnancy, older women in the family chant mantras encouraging the fetus to become male.

Cultural Reasons

There is strong cultural pressure for wanting a son as well. It is believed that the son is the one who continues the family lineage. An easy to spot sign of this is the long standing tradition of married women changing their last name after marriage, a literal change and adoption of their husband’s identity. Another strong cultural belief is that women are harder to raise because they need to be protected and defended at all times. Essentially, girls are seen as a burden and boys as an asset. This is tied directly to the final and most important consideration – money. Boys have always been seen as the breadwinners in Indian society and girls as homemakers. More disturbingly however, from birth, girls are viewed as the future member of another family. A popular saying in India is “raising a girl is like watering a plant in your neighbor's yard.” Boys on the other hand are expected to continue to live with their parents after marriage and provide financial security till death.[37] Finally, the single most important cause of daughters being viewed as liabilities is India’s horrendous dowry system.

Economic Reasons

Dowry is defined as ‘an amount of property or money brought by a bride to her husband on their marriage’.[38] It is a practice rooted in ancient Hindu tradition, outlined in the Manusmriti. In ancient India, the presentation of gifts from both the bride and groom’s family to each other was a required cultural practice. The bride’s father would traditionally give her clothes, and the groom’s father would give him a bull or a cow. At the end of the wedding ceremonies, when the daughter would leave for her new husband’s home, her father would give her jewelry, money, and property to help ensure she was financially independent even after marriage.[39] This tradition also existed because women did not inherit the family’s wealth, that was a right reserved exclusively for the male child.[40] Dowry was seen as a way to balance this and give the daughter her share in the family’s wealth. In fact, this argument is still commonly presented in India today, despite the passage of legislation such as the 1956 Hindu Succession Act, which made it so daughters and sons both have equal rights in their family’s property.[41] Of course, a legal right does not translate into cultural practice. Even today, most girls in India do not receive anything upon the death of their parents if they have any male siblings. Only sons are mentioned in wills. Regardless of this, the ancient intentions of equal wealth distribution between sons and daughters has long disappeared and what remains is a highly transactional modern system.

Today, the amount of dowry paid by a bride’s family depends on a range of factors, including region, religion, caste, the groom’s education, the bride’s skin tone, and the negotiation skills of both the families involved.[42]Arranged marriages are mostly business deals. In rural India, a wedding only occurs after a certain amount of dowry has been paid. What is most disturbing is that this is not seen as a problem at all, but rather a matter of pride. Both the bride and groom’s family flaunt and brag about how much they gave and received in dowry. It has also become a way for families to try to ‘marry up’ by paying higher dowries. Dowry is seen as compensation for the groom’s parents for the money they have spent educating their son and making him capable of providing for the bride for the rest of her life. This is tied deeply to the strongly held notion that only men are capable of earning money for the family, not women. As a result of this mindset, dowry is actually more prevalent amongst well educated men in India.[43] Therefore, a lack of education is difficult to cite as a cause. Education seems to increase the practice of dowry, as it increases the amount of money a son is worth on the marriage market.

India outlawed the practice of dowry in 1961, with the Dowry Prohibition Act, which criminalized both giving or taking dowry with a mandatory minimum prison sentence of five years as well as a fine equivalent to the dowry amount.[44] However, dowry is defined in the Act as a gift demanded or given as a precondition to marriage. This means that voluntary gifts are not covered by the law. All this law has accomplished in India is change the way in which dowry discussions are had. Instead of demand it, the families of grooms simply advise the bride’s family to give their daughter “whatever they can.” Just by switching the phrasing, the burden presenting a socially acceptable ‘gift’ is shifted to the bride, and is no longer an explicit demand of dowry, and therefore is no longer illegal. 

Due to the social prevalence of the practice, it is rarely reported as a crime. The NCRB reports that despite over 10 million weddings taking place annually in India, under 10 000 cases of dowry are reported each year. Dowry is usually only reported when demands for it go beyond what the bride can afford. When reported, most cases fall under domestic abuse laws. This is because the failure to make dowry payments leads to continual physical and mental abuse on a newly wed bride. In 2015, over 113 000 women reported being beaten by their husbands over dowry disputes.[45]Indian police report they receive over 9 000 cases a year of women killed because of dowry.[46] Out of that number, close to 2 500 are those of women burned alive. This means that at least 23 women are killed every single day in India because of dowry.

Dowry is also an excellent example of solution aversion, which is the idea that people are less likely to believe that something’s a problem if they have “an aversion to the solutions associated with the problem.” The solution to dowry is simply not taking or giving it. In this case, the families of men do not want to believe there is anything wrong with the system because they stand to gain the most financially from it’s continuance.

What’s Been Done About It?  

Legislative Efforts

In the 1970s, Indian medical researchers declared that knowing whether a baby was a girl or boy was not likely to influence sex ratios.[47] They were proven wrong quickly. The results of the 1981 census immediately displayed signs of a skewed child sex ratio. A decade later, in 1991, census data revealed a continued drop in child sex ratio. A heated national debate followed. Articles were written, documentaries were filmed. The scientific community acknowledged its initial hypothesis was severely misguided and radically altered its stance on the effects of prenatal diagnosis. The practice was affecting India’s sex ratio in an unprecedented manner. Around the same time, the international community was also drawing serious attention to the practice of female feticide across Asia, particularly India and China. In 1994, the government of India passed the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act (PNDT), which came into effect in 1996, nearly 25 years after the practice had first began.[48] A generation had passed. Amongst experts who had lambasted the government’s inaction for years, hopes were high. Strict legislation had finally been passed.

The PNDT Act prohibited sex selection and regulated prenatal diagnostic techniques to prevent their misuse. It was ambitiously broad in its scope. Offences under the act included conducting or helping in the conduct of any prenatal diagnostic technique, sex selection on a man or woman, conducting PND tests for any purpose other than the ones mentioned explicitly in the Act. The most important step taken was the mandatory registration of every single ultrasound scanner in the country, regardless of what it was being used for. Furthermore, the sale, distribution, supply, or renting of any unregistered ultrasound machine or any other equipment capable of detecting sex of the fetus was prohibited. The registration procedure was to be arduous and complex, to ensure only those professionals who could prove the legitimate use of the machines would have access to them. Legitimate uses included determining genetic abnormalities and other sex linked disorders. Additionally, communicating the sex of a fetus to a pregnant woman or her relatives by words, signs or any other method was outlawed. Finally, any advertisements related to pre-natal sex detection in any form were criminalized. In 2003, the Act was amended, increasing penalties up to10,000–50,000 rupees and mandatory prison sentences up to 3–5 years. How effective were these measures? Not very.

Despite it’s achievements as a comprehensive piece of legislation, the PNDT Act has been a failure. In its 2010 review of the Act, the Public Health Foundation of India acknowledged that “Data up to 2006 reveals that as many as 22 of the 35 states in India had not reported a single violation of the Act since it came into force.”[49] Not a single violation in a country of over a billion people. Not a single violation over a period of 20 years. This figure holds true even today in 2018. Between 2004 and 2013, a total of 1,263 cases of female feticide were recorded by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) of India.[50] That number is offensively low considering that a 2004 study estimated over 6 million abortions taking place annually in India, of which, around 1 million are sex selective.[51] What can explain this incredible differential? The greatest enforcement hurdle of the PNDT Act is that while sex determination is illegal, abortion is perfectly legal in India.

India’s Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act of 1971 was created to regulate and ensure access to safe abortions, allowing the termination of a pregnancy up to 20 weeks of pregnancy in cases where “the continuance of the pregnancy would involve a risk to the life of the pregnant woman or of grave injury to her physical or mental health” or “there is substantial risk that if the child were born, it would suffer from such physical or mental abnormalities to be seriously handicapped”.[52] This has remained an unanswered policy question in India for decades now. How are prosecutors to prove the connection between sex determination and the subsequent abortion? The two events are almost always carried out by different professional at different locations and at different times. India’s failure to successfully enforce the PNDT is hardly limited to this logistical and evidentiary difficulty however. A host of other problems have been documented.

Perhaps the most easily and often targeted offenders are the medical professionals earning obscene profits from these practices. It is an undisputed fact that the medical community vigorously promoted and advertised the use of sex determination technology before the PNDT act was passed. While the passing of the act criminalized virtually every aspect of the practice however, demand across India was so strong, and the financial incentives so large, that many practitioners hardly took notice of the Act. After all, which customer was going to report an activity they themselves so desperately wanted? Even if they did, it would be next to impossible to prove that the abortion was due to the sex of the baby and not some other legally permissible reason. Prosecution rates under the Act were, and continue to be, virtually zero. These market dynamics, combined with the well documented corruption of local police forces (especially those in the poorest areas) meant that the practice of prenatal sex determination has continued unabated since the passing of the PNDT Act. If anything, the criminalization of the practice has created a large underground economy, creating more room for exploitation and corruption. In 2014, former Indian Health Minister Harsh Vardhan declared “It is clear that the focus on the providers of sex selection services has not worked over the past 20 years.”

Financial Incentives

Over the past 15 years, states across India have launched programs known as Conditional Cash Transfer (CCTs). The primary purpose of these programs has been to “improve the survival and welfare of girls and reverse the distorted sex ratio at birth.”[53] They are a marked departure from the legislative approach utilized earlier. Instead of punishing those who are killing girls, this approach seeks to incentivize families to keep them alive by providing money following the fulfillment of certain verifiable conditions. These conditions vary by state, but are generally things like registration of birth, childhood immunization, enrollment and retention in school, and delaying marriage until after the girl turns 18 years old. Upon proof of these predetermined metrics, families receive a cash award, which is supposed to be used for the benefit of the girl. While the effectiveness of these programs will not be fully understood for some time to come as they are relatively young, some investigations are already reporting their abuse. For example, financial incentives that become available around the time of marriage are now being used to pay dowry, legitimizing yet another illegal activity. Additionally, some schemes only give out cash if a family accepts sterilization after 2 children. Others limit the cash transfer to just two girls, with a larger incentive for the first one born as compared to the second. It is obvious that the intention behind many of these programs is not only the birth of girls, but also to promote smaller families. Most importantly, the financial handout does little to change the perceived negativity associated with giving birth to a daughter.

Why Aren’t These Ideas Working?

While the efforts described above have targeted the problem using a ‘carrot and stick’ approach, they have both failed miserably at influencing behaviours to create lasting change.  The money has been used as a carrot, dangled in front of families to convince them to keep their girl alive for a financial reward in the future. This kind of incentive does very little to change the underlying mindset of a family that sees a girl as unable to take care of her parents in old age however. The laws were passed as sticks, warning families and doctors that they were at risk of financial penalties and possible jail time. Even if we ignore the fact that they were hardly enforced, the laws still do nothing to shift the mindset of families that are worried about having to pay large sums in dowry in the future if they give birth to a girl. Most importantly, both of these solutions target couples. They target families in which women are already pregnant. The legislation warns not to abort a girl simply because she is a she, and the financial programs urge them to keep them. But by this time, it is too late to meaningful change a deeply ingrained mindset.  

There are several pieces of data which, taken together as a whole, paint a picture that the problem at it’s very core is primarily one of mindset. The first piece of evidence is simply the failure of the above mentioned efforts. The zeal with which the systemic elimination of girls has persisted over the decades in India despite all of these concentrated efforts shows just how strong the demand for male children in India is. People are willing to risk breaking any law. They are not motivated by promises of money. A reaction to the problem is that it is one of education and economics. The argument goes, uneducated and poorer families are more likely to not want to have baby girls, therefore the solution is to increase education levels and enable women to become financially independent. While that solution is a noble one, and of course a higher level of education and women empowerment would be helpful, I believe these would still fall short of fixing people’s mindset. Here’s why.

First, according Census data since 1901, sex ratios at birth have consistently been lower in richer urban areas than in poor rural areas. Second, states which have consistently had the lowest sex ratios over the past five decades are also the richest. Each of them have some of the highest rates of both male and female education in the country as well as some of the highest per capita income. Third, studies show that sex ratios are lower among educated mothers and in the 20% of the richest households than among uneducated mothers and 20% of the poorest households. Lastly, there is an increasingly large body of work being accumulated outside of India, in the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States which shows that the sex ratio amongst children of Indians living in those countries is skewed from what it would normally be. Taken together, these data points paint a stark picture. The grim reality of the matter is, regardless of education, socioeconomic background, or even country of residence, Indians prefer to give birth to boys and are more than willing to take the steps necessary in order to ensure it. An anti-girl mindset is the root of the problem. It is this mindset which must be altered if change is to be made in any meaningful manner.

What Else Can Be Done?

The practices of dowry and female feticide are intimately connected, and should not be dealt as two separate social movements, but rather as one vicious cycle. While activists and researchers on both sides have long recognized the connection between the two, there is yet to be a social movement which treats them as two sides of the same coin. I believe both practices can, should, and will go down together. The current scenario is one where those who participate in sex selective abortions look to the problem of dowry in justifying their decision to abort girls and those who engage in the practice dowry do not see any serious problems or costs associated with it. The reality however is that each practice fuels the other. As dowry prices go up, it becomes more and more profitable to give birth to a son. At the same time, daughters become even more of a liability. It is a vicious cycle. A simple reframing of the situation would then be to educate those engaging in the practice of dowry of it’s true social cost – the millions of girls lost every year. An apt slogan could be “Dowry Kills.” Once this connection between the two practices has been communicated, attention can be turned to the other social consequences of female feticide. The second key insight in developing my strategy is that the common connection between both problems is marriage. Marriage is the bridge between dowry and pregnancy. Therefore, a good way to think about influencing behaviour around both practices is to frame it around the context of marriages.

In creating change, it is important to think carefully about which demographic we are targeting. For this problem, adolescents are the ideal for a variety of reasons. First, and most importantly, there are a lot of them. No country in the world has more young people than India.

More than half of India’s population, a staggering 600 million people, are under 25 years old. They literally make up the world’s largest ever cohort of like-minded young people. The way they think will be the way India thinks in the future. Targeting their views and opinions on dowry and female feticide is not only important, it is absolutely necessary. If they continue to believe in the same values generations before them have, sex ratios in 50 years will be catastrophic in India. Secondly, adolescents are a group of individuals at the stage in life immediately preceding marriage. They are not so young that any communication about these problems will be long forgotten by the time it is relevant to their own lives, nor are they already married and having children, in which case it might be too late to influence their beliefs. Rather, they are perfectly poised to be educated on the costs of dowry and female feticide and act on it themselves. It is important to remember there are no immediate fixes to sex ratios. The problem by it’s very nature manifests itself slowly over time. But the solution can be implemented immediately with the next cohort of women in India that get pregnant. And those women, at this very moment, are unmarried teenagers looking for suitors. Another reason to target adolescents is that that they are most likely to be at the forefront of technology in India. They are more likely to be connected to the Internet than any other demographic, and therefore also more likely to be influenced by social media campaigns and advertisements. This connectivity is not only important in getting messages to them, but it also means they are far more likely to be interconnected amongst themselves, making it easier for new trends to catch on. An information cascade is more likely to take place in an environment where more and more decisions made by others can be seen by an individual. This is perfect for social media and viral trends. Therefore, it is imperative for change to occur that the young people of India are specifically targeted before they are of marriageable age and before they have children.

The enduring preference for sons in India and the resulting practices of female feticide and dowry have exacted an unimaginable toll on millions of unborn girls, countless young women, and Indian society as a whole. Over decades, legal reforms, government initiatives, and technological advancements have all failed to disrupt the deeply ingrained cultural mindset that favors sons, reflecting the power of societal values and economic pressures in shaping human choices. To truly alter this trajectory, it’s essential to focus not merely on legislation or financial incentives but on transforming the social fabric that sustains these practices. By targeting the younger generation—India’s vast adolescent population—the message can be spread that dowry and female feticide are not merely individual decisions but part of a cycle of harm that undermines the very society they inhabit. It is this generation, armed with awareness and connected by technology, that holds the power to reject outdated ideologies and embrace a future where every child is equally valued. With strategic, culturally resonant education and campaigns directed toward this demographic, India can begin to shift toward a society that not only recognizes but celebrates the inherent worth of its daughters.

Citations

[1] Paraya Dhan.” IMDb, IMDb.com, www.imdb.com/title/tt0067553/.

[2] Kishwar, Purnima. “The Paraya Dhan Mindset.” Https://Www.outlookindia.com/, Outlookindia.com, 12 Apr. 2004, www.outlookindia.com/website/story/the-paraya-dhan-mindset/223604.

[3] Delhi, Associated Press in New Delhi. “More than 63 Million Women 'Missing' in India, Statistics Show.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 30 Jan. 2018, www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/30/more-than-63-million-women-missing-in-india-statistics-show.

[4] “Infanticide.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/infanticide.

[5] Vishwanath, L. S. (2007), "Female Infanticide, Property and the Colonial State", in Patel, Tulsi, Sex-Selective Abortion in India: Gender, Society and New Reproductive Technologies

[6] Miller, Barbara D. (1987), "Female Infanticide and Child Neglect in Rural India", in Scheper-Hughes, Nancy,Child Survival: Anthropological Perspectives on the Treatment and Maltreatment of Children

[7] “Female Infanticide Prevention Act, 1870.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 9 Nov. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_Infanticide_Prevention_Act,_1870.

[8] Sabu George, et al. “Female Infanticide in Rural South India.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 27, no. 22, 1992, pp. 1153–1156. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/4398446.

[9] Hesketh, T., and Z. W. Xing. “Abnormal Sex Ratios in Human Populations: Causes and Consequences.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 103, no. 36, 2006, pp. 13271–13275., doi:10.1073/pnas.0602203103.

[10] Madan, Kamlesh, and Martijn H. Breuning. “Impact of Prenatal Technologies on the Sex Ratio in India: an Overview.” Genetics in Medicine, vol. 16, no. 6, 2013, pp. 425–432., doi:10.1038/gim.2013.172.

[11] Verma, I. C., et al. “Genetic Counseling and Prenatal Diagnosis in India — Experience at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.” The Indian Journal of Pediatrics, vol. 70, no. 4, 2003, pp. 293–297., doi:10.1007/bf02723582.

[12] Marshall, John F. “Comments on the Mania for Sons: An Analysis of Social Values in South Asia, A. Ramanamma and Usha Bambawale.” Social Science & Medicine, vol. 16, no. 8, 1982, pp. 879–880., doi:10.1016/0277-9536(82)90205-2.

[13] Tandon SL, Sharma R. Female foeticide and infanticide in India: an analysis of crimes against girl children. Int J Crim Justice Sci 2006 http://www.sascv.org/ijcjs/previousissues.html

[14] Woo, Dr. Joseph. “A Short History of the Real-Time Ultrasound Scanner.” History of Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology, Part 1, 2001, www.ob-ultrasound.net/history-realtime.html.

[15] Rosenblum , Daniel. The Indian Ultrasound Paradox. 2012, ftp.iza.org/dp6273.pdf.

[16] Becker, Dawn M., et al. “The Use of Portable Ultrasound Devices in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: a Systematic Review of the Literature.” Tropical Medicine & International Health, vol. 21, no. 3, 2016, pp. 294–311., doi:10.1111/tmi.12657.

[17] Jaco, Jeff. “100 Million Missing Girls.” Boston.com, The Boston Globe, 14 Mar. 2010, archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2010/03/14/100_million_missing_girls/.

[18] Vishwanathan, Asha. “Femicide: The Silent Genocide Taking Place in India.” The Alternative, The Alternative, www.thealternative.in/society/femicide-the-silent-genocide-taking-place-in-india/.

[19] 10 million female births aborted in India: study, The Hindu, 10 January 2006, available at http://www.thehindu. com/todays-paper/tp-international/10-million-female-births-aborted-in-india-study/article3237700.ece

[20] Suroor, Hasan. “10 Million Female Births Aborted in India: Study.” The Hindu, The Hindu, 26 Mar. 2012, www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-international/10-million-female-births-aborted-in-india-study/article3237700.ece.

[21] Gatrad, AR, and M Ray. “Hindu Birth Customs.” Archives of Disease in Childhood, BMJ Publishing Group Ltd, 1 Dec. 2004, adc.bmj.com/content/89/12/1094.

[22] UNICEF. Ending Child Marriage. 2014, www.unicef.org/media/files/Child_Marriage_Report_7_17_LR..pdf.

[23] Hesketh, T., and Z. W. Xing. “Abnormal Sex Ratios in Human Populations: Causes and Consequences.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 103, no. 36, 2006, pp. 13271–13275., doi:10.1073/pnas.0602203103.

[24] Satish B. Agnihotri. “Declining Infant and Child Mortality in India: How Do Girl Children Fare?” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 36, no. 3, 2001, pp. 228–233. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/4410198.

[25] “List of States and Union Territories of India by Sex Ratio.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 8 Nov. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_union_territories_of_India_by_sex_ratio.

[26] Guruswamy, Dr. S. “Girl Child.” Google Books, Google, books.google.ca/books?id=Ak2PrI7mQToC&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=rajasthan%2Bvillages%2Bno%2Bgirls%2Bborn

[27] Goldsmith, Belinda. “Exclusive: India Most Dangerous Country for Women with Sexual...” Reuters, Thomson Reuters, 26 June 2018, www.reuters.com/article/us-women-dangerous-poll-

[28] DailyBite, Dailybite. “NCRB Data 2016: India Continues to Be a Terrifying Place for Women and Children.” DailyO - Opinion News & Analysis on Latest Breaking News India, Living Media India Limited, 1 Dec. 2017, www.dailyo.in/variety/ncrb-data-2016-crimes-against-women-human-trafficking-cyber-crime/story/1/20867.html.

[29] Dreze, Jean, and Reetika Khera. “Crime, Gender, and Society in India: Insights from Homicide Data.” Population and Development Review, vol. 26, no. 2, 2000, pp. 335–352., doi:10.1111/j.1728-4457.2000.00335.x.

[30] Roberts, Joseph Palmer. “Bare Branches: The Security Implications of Asia's Surplus Male Population (Review).” Population Review, vol. 44, no. 1, 2005, doi:10.1353/prv.2005.0007.

[31] Bhat, Upasana. “South Asia | Prostitution 'Increases' in India.” BBC News, BBC, 3 July 2006, news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/5140526.stm.

[32] Wermen, Macro. “The Trafficking of Girls in India.” Public Radio International, PRI, www.pri.org/stories/2013-01-09/trafficking-girls-india.

[33] Jolley, Mary Ann. “'Sold like Cows and Goats': India's Slave Brides.” GCC News | Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, 14 Nov. 2016, www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2016/11/cows-goats-india-slave-brides-161114084933017.html.

[34] Agarwal, Nimai. “Evolving Gender Roles in the Vedas.” The Heroic Spirit: How Does Time Shape Our View of Heroes? | KidSpirit, 16 Dec. 2016, kidspiritonline.com/magazine/the-soul-of-gender/evolving-gender-roles-in-the-vedas/.

[35] Daniélou Alain. Virtue, Success, Pleasure & Liberation: the Four Aims of Life in the Tradition of Ancient India. Inner Traditions International, 1993.

[36] Kassam, Zayn. Women and Asian Religions. S.n., 2017.

[37] Abhinand, Ramya. “4 Reasons Why Indians Prefer Sons Over Daughters.” HuffPost India, HuffPost India, 5 Nov. 2016, www.huffingtonpost.in/ramya-abhinand/4-reasons-why-indians-prefer-sons-over-daughters_a_21577330/.

[38] “Dowry.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dowry.

[39] Sarda, Mukund. “The Concept of 'Dowry' and 'Dowry Death' - a Study in the Light of Supreme Court Decision in Ashok Kumar's Case.” SSRN Electronic Journal, 2011, doi:10.2139/ssrn.2711605.

[40] Patel, Reena. “The Development of Females’ Proprietary Rights in Hindu Law.” Hindu Women’s Property Rights in Rural India, pp. 43–57., doi:10.4324/9781351156400-3.

[41] “Hindu Succession Act, 1956.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 9 Nov. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_Succession_Act,_1956.

[42] Sukumar, Kavya. “Dowries Are Illegal in India. But Families - Including Mine - Still Expect Them.” Vox.com, Vox Media, 6 Feb. 2017, www.vox.com/first-person/2017/2/6/14403490/dowry-india-bride-groom-dilemma.

[43] Jha, Nishita. “The Despicable Persistence of the Dowry in India.” The Daily Beast, The Daily Beast Company, 4 Aug. 2014, www.thedailybeast.com/the-despicable-persistence-of-the-dowry-in-india.

[44] Lodhia, Sharmila. “Dowry Prohibition Act.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 24 Apr. 2018, www.britannica.com/event/Dowry-Prohibition-Act.

[45] “Dowry-Related Violence.” Consequences of Sexual Assault on the Community, www.stopvaw.org/dowry-related_violence.

[46] Chakraborty, Surangama, and S Rajan. “Dowry Death, a Global Issue That Demands Action.” Medico-Legal Update, vol. 18, no. 1, 2017, p. 112., doi:10.5958/0974-1283.2018.00024.5.

[47] Roberts, Lisa R and Susanne B Montgomery. “India's Distorted Sex Ratio: Dire Consequences for Girls” Journal of Christian nursing : a quarterly publication of Nurses Christian Fellowship vol. 33,1 (2016): E7-E15.

[48] Bhaktwani, Anita. “The PC-PNDT act in a nutshell” Indian journal of radiology & imaging vol. 22,2 (2012): 133-4.

[49] Tabaie, Sheida. “Stopping female feticide in India: the failure and unintended consequence of ultrasound restriction” Journal of global health vol. 7,1 (2017): 010304.

[50] http://ncrb.gov.in/StatPublications/CII/CII2016/pdfs/Crime%20Statistics%20-%202016.pdf

[51] Rose, Collette. “National Estimate of Abortion in India Released.” Guttmacher Institute, 20 Dec. 2017, www.guttmacher.org/news-release/2017/national-estimate-abortion-india-released.

[52] http://tcw.nic.in/Acts/MTP-Act-1971.pdf

[53] Randive, Bharat, et al. “India’s Conditional Cash Transfer Programme (the JSY) to Promote Institutional Birth: Is There an Association between Institutional Birth Proportion and Maternal Mortality?” PLoS ONE, vol. 8, no. 6, 2013, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0067452.