Indian girls 'more likely to die'

indiamike

Medical research in India suggests that baby girls are much more likely to die than infant boys, even from illnesses that can be treated.

The research, published in the British Medical Journal, was carried out at St Stephen's Hospital in Delhi.

The report concludes that the imbalance in the proportion of deaths may be due to the fact that baby girls are less welcome and are treated less favourably by parents.

India has an unusual gender balance.

Full Story at BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/h...ia/3076727.stm

wonderwomanusa

I have read several articles that indicate this ... not surprised to see it again, except I wonder if they are re-circulating the same old "news" to inflame people.

With such a small number of Indian women, the country will be full of crusty old bachelors one of these days...

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The map is not the territory. --Alfred Korzybski

Mirjam

Thanks for informing us, Mike.

These kind of articles, however, do irritate me in a way: these facts are so very much known for years and years together now. All the time, people (scientists and activists alike) seem to be re-inventing the wheel, instead of really changing the situation that cause these these known facts.

It's frustrating....!

Mirjam

That is true, Samsara, and we DO work with very powerful women in (and from) India. It is sad that, although Indian history shows very powerful women, the impact on the majority of Indian women is limited, if you ask me....

And cannot you object to your dowry? Cannot you write poetry and take your time out of choice? And not because your guardians ask a dowry too high? They should not ask for a dowry at all, because they are involved in an illegal business! Where does change have to start? With women like YOU!

Mirjam

Thanks for your reaction, Samasara. But then I don't understand the first sentence of your previous message:

I'm still a kumari/brahmacharini because unfortunately my guardians set my bride price too high and no one could afford me. I don't mind, it gives me lots of time to meditate and write poetry.

What do you mean by those words if you say your family doesn't take or give dowry? I read you are still unmarried because of a too high dowry that's asked? Or don't I understand your email?

And your a perfectly right that not all Indian women are victims. And you are also right that one has to be careful with official statistics. I always try to be critical.

Even I (Western) like to be in touch with "Indian" things, because I see a lot of good things in India too! I am glad I don't only see the negative, that would be wrong and would stop me from being there several months a year!

Mirjam

Samsara

I deleted my confusing post, Mirjam. I'm very interested in your work. Please IM me if you would like to tell me more or post here.

What I wanted to say, is that what the newspaper article reports, does not apply in my family, where women are as valued as men. I know at least a few other ethnic Indian groups where the article facts don't apply.

As for life choices in my family, it's just like it is for a lot of families in your country, you do what you want. Nobody is going to stop you. I'm not married and it's an absolute non-issue in my family, I was brought up in a totally modern way (though I would have preferred to be reincarnated in the tribe where the women get to have as many husbands as they want and have total power.)

Mirjam

I am glad you can make your own choices! That's very important. You are in Australia, which does make a difference... I work in (very traditional) Varanasi, where the situation in many families is very different from yours. Many young women don't have any say in marriage matters. Unfortunately!

Samsara

It doesn't matter whether I'm in Australia or not, this applies to my entire female family in India also - those who are full-blood Indian, as there are so many different ethnicities and customs in India. But my Indian family haven't actually followed old customs for at least half a century, and those old customs to do with marriage and inheritance were different to many other communities. So one can't just lump the whole of India (an area as diverse as Europe is) under a heading "Indians are this or that".

I am really happy to hear that you decided to devote so much of your time to this project. I looked at the webpage and it would be great if a safe house could be created, and I was also interested to learn that a plastic surgeon is donating time to these women. I think more of this sort of thing should be done. But at the same time I wish there was more info on your webpage as to who are these women. Varanasi is a pilgrimage city so are these women from diverse communities who have come to Varanasi for shelter or did it happen within communities in Varanasi?

Abortion happens when majority groups start influencing minority groups in India to practice their cultural way, "patriarchal, "puritan" (gee, I can think of a lot of Western families like that too), "middle class" etc, which is the danger of just a few groups dominating. A lot of safety nets go when people are told their ways are morally unsound either by Indian or foreign interest groups. So I like it you're doing something but at the same time I feel people from "outside" whether Indian or foreign fall into the danger of imposing their own standards on people. And quite a few Indians and foreigners not from particular communties are imposing their own standards on other peoples at the moment, and this is creating a lot of problems, homogenization from without. Change should ideally come from within the community itself with perhaps help from outside if they seek it.

The area where I used to live as a child, extreme left wing guerilla groups haven't bothered with NGOs for over 30 years. No one in that area nowadays dares bother with dowry or big weddings. In fact, irate fathers fed up with big dowry demands have found a creative solution to the problem by kidnapping unsuspecting young males who wander into their area and then marrying them off to their daughters.


I didn't really want to be so frank, Mirjam, but I will (and I'm sorry if this will offend anyone) but I know which communities in India tend to have suspiciously low ratio of girls to boys and these communities are to, lets say, the west and they tend to be "nouveau riche" and they are influencing poorer people who can't afford it to follow these customs. There are are certain cities in India where I'm worried about sexual harrassment and then there are certain whole areas of India I would worry about other things but not sexual harrasment, more a case of "never mind the bombs" due to Maoists et al. In these kind of states which tourists tend to avoid, at least the tribals and poor villagers are getting a fair go, and the dalit chief minister who influenced by let's say Bollywood type style living has to go to Mumbai to put on the lavish wedding of his dalit daughter, which is attended by top Bollywood stars and Delhi and Mumbai movers and shakers and politicians because he is too scared he will be attacked in his own state for wasting huge sums of money while most people have almost next to nothing.

There is now such a shortage of women in some communities that men are now having to go to other areas and pay bride price for a bride or marry out of their community.

But there are certain areas of India where men are complaining they want more rights (as they are living under a matriarchal system). But these kind of diverse ways of living of minority groups are increasingly dying out under influences which may not necessarily be that great from other parts of India and the West.

Or how the British (since I'm half British I can say this without seeming impolite) reinvented racism, genocide and slavery but on a scale the world has never seen before, that's why there are so many "white" people in countries like USA, Australia, etc (I can say this because I am half "white"). And what about the Netherlands, how did they leave Indonesia? Why is the Netherlands so rich now? So no point pointing the finger and printing misinformation, because it begins to open up a can of worms for all us humans on this planet, including domestic violence in the West and killings resulting from that by "white" men. But most men and women are not like this and domestic violence itself occurs for different reasons, so lets stop pointing fingers and saying my society is better than yours.

Samsara

OK, as a trained lawyer and historian (with minors in anthropology, sociology etc) I will try and answer in a few brief sentences why some "Indians" practise customs that seem very strange and immoral to other peoples. The fact is these customs are not strange, the human race has been experimenting with various social combinations of how to live together in related units since the beginning of the human species. Dowry, male primogeniture is common to many societies, as well as other systems. I find it ironic it was still being practised by the English aristocracy till up to WWII (the women came often with dowry, the "portion", and only male heirs can usually inherit most English titles). Frankly, a modern "Western" church marriage is as odd a social structure as any from a researcher's viewpoint.

Let's get specific about infanticide and foeticide <<Meanwhile, in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, human rights groups are trying to help mothers found guilty of killing female offspring, saying the women are as much the victims as the babies. >> Human beings have in all societies have been practising this since for ever also, for many reasons that may not seem bad to the society in question. Some of these women in Tamil Nadu are still living in an ancient traditional village type structure. I don't know what reason they're doing it for (they can't afford dowry, they can't afford another mouth who knows) but to criminalise it is insane. Some areas of Tamil Nadu have a left baby area so these women can leave their babies instead of "killing" (another loaded term) them, but this created more problems (like cute "brown" babies suddenly available for Western couples to adopt who will grow up alienated from their culture. You might not think it matters but just wait till that baby grows up and starts asking questions.) Women like these have their own beliefs (that don't fit in with moral majority "Christian" beliefs) so by outlawing things like abortion, sex determination and adoption from distant relatives by paying a price other problems are being created, like illegal abortions that will totally wreck that woman's health (abortion has been practised since the beginning of time too, legislators and moral crusaders never learn do they?)

Anyway, enough said but I personally think someone should force the BBC to rewrite this article, it is sensational. Just like my respected Australian paper that prides itself on its journalism but still wrote "the pagan islanders" (some present day Solomon Islanders, Australia has sent in a policing force there and the newspaper was referring to two tribal men that had been taken into custody on a certain matter but they didn't write two men from "name" tribe they wrote "pagan islanders")

I won't say one more word on this subject but I hope this answers some of those "why, why, why" questions Westerners often ask. The fact is that the British couldn't wipe out most Indians as they were too numerous (unlike the Australian aborigines) and luckily there were too few of them to interfere in too many social groups (though they did effect quite a few) so most Indians are still living out of sync in the anthropological sense with the "developed" Western countries. Some countries in this world for various reasons got to this point in space and time quicker than others, that's all. And now I will seal my lips on this subject.

Indiantoo

Thanks Samsara,
The things you say are representative of what most indians including myself think. No community has proven themselves competent to comment on others since they all have their fair share of double standards. Its much easier to see hypocrisy being Indian since we know that many things done in the west are wrong by Indian standards and many other things in India are wrong for the rest of the world.

We need more people speaking up like you so things are seen in perspective.

I dared to disagree with someone's comment on the now outdated Aryan invasion theory and got so badly slammed (despite showing evidence) that I decided not to contribute for a while. Perhaps I thought, not everyone is ready to think out of their safety boxes (despite some of the very mature contributors on the site).
As for me, I am an Indian woman with all the rights I could ever want, brought up in India, within the system and have always fought for women's rights. There are many like me and we make a difference...by talking to the men, women, elders(decision-makers) and setting them thinking. Generally in Southern India, a woman is not denied the right to speak for herself as is common is some parts of the northwest.

Things are different here in Singapore, battles remain, but they are different. Here I have to fight for Indians and set right popular misconceptions about them.

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Samsara

Well, I was considering deleting all my posts here in this thread, as Mirjam and IndiaMike, my posts here have nothing to do with you, but I thought it might be taken as being rude to poor Mirjam who is really obviously trying to something worthwhile. But on the other hand, I've noticed (despite being half-"white" and coming across as totally "westernized") racism coming my way in Australia this year that I've never noticed before. I'm personally frightened for the first time in my life about having slightly "eastern" looks and a "strange" name. Obviously, some racism has come my way over the years but I never took it in due I think the incredible self-respect and confidence and total rights that were given to me in my childhood in India, I was pretty oblivious. But now things are reaching a dangerous level again I think in many countries. A Russian Jewish immigrant to Australia, a lady in Sydney, advised me to change my name to an "anglo" name about 10 years ago, and I said, why on earth would I want to do that? Now, I understand exactly what she means. And if I am encountering these problems, I can't imagine what it must be like for full-blood "others" (ie non "whites"). So I felt I just had to dispel some myths. But from now on I have absolutely nothing to say on this matter. I don't have much time in my life and I like to come to this board and other boards to have fun. So, this is my last word on this thread. But there are too many dangerous myths floating around the world leading to extremely dangerous stereotyping of peoples.

Alan D

Indiantoo......this is slightly off topic!

Welcome back to the forum! You say you decided not to contribute for a while as you had been '''badly slammed" on the Indian history issue. I think that is a very emotive term to describe the fact that others disagreed with you. Most of us on this forum have been "slammed" at one time or another - it happens...... it's part of the rough and tumble of an open forum and sometimes it's useful in making us think about our way of seeing things.

I stayed out of the original discussion because I thought I could see where it was leading but as you brought it up again I now feel ( as one of the "mature" members) I should respond.

As many of us know, Indian history is now being rewritten on the basis of the Indian holy books and there is much controversy inside India on this. It's not true to say that the Aryan invasion theory is outdated. There are now two theories (or more) and they have their advocates and detractors.

You put forward your theory.....others disagreed. It was an interesting discussion on a controversial topic.

I hope you will continue to post on the forum.

Samsara, just read your last post. You're thinking of leaving the forum??? Why?? I've read all your contributions (as I have everyone else's) and I've found them very enlightening. Rooted in two cultures you have an interesting perspective to offer. Please stay.


Sorry misread your post! You said your last words on "this thread"