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The headline from a BBC News story: Baby Survives Being Buried Alive A two-day-old baby girl in India has survived after being buried alive in a field by her maternal grandfather in the south of the country. The baby, who had apparently never been fed, was discovered by a farmer near a village some 150 km south of Hyderabad. He said he spotted her because her tiny hand was sticking out of the soil. Police arrested the baby’s grandfather after he confessed to trying to kill the baby by burying her alive. “I am yet to marry off four daughters and cannot take responsibility for a fifth one, even when she’s only a granddaughter,” he said. A girl child is often viewed as inferior to a boy and a bride’s dowry can cripple a family financially. |
Government figures suggest that around 10 million girls have been killed by their parents — either in the womb or immediately after birth — over the past two decades. Interestingly, as a result, the worst-affected states, such as Haryana and Punjab, now have some of the most skewed sex ratios in the world. In Haryana, for example, a quarter of the female population has simply disappeared. As a result, a whole generation of young men is failing to find brides. Ironically, many are now resorting to buying brides from poor communities outside the region to bear their children. For those baby girls who do survive birth, the latest research suggests that discrimination may persist into childhood. This is especially true in the case of sudden, unexplained deaths: three out of four cases were girls. There was no gender gap in deaths from non-preventable diseases, but deaths due to diarrhea — which is treatable — were twice as likely to happen to girls as to boys. Prejudice runs deep. In Punjab, special prayers of thanks greet the birth of a boy. Girls are born into silence. "People say, you have two girl children, you have done some sins in your past life," said office manager Surinder Saini. "With a boy child, people say your generation will propagate, your older age will be safer. This is the concept of our society." In researching this work, not only did I feel shocked at the tragedy for the baby girls, but wondered about the impact on "The Preferred," the boys who were left to live. "The Preferred" (2007)
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