Church steps in to challenge Indian acceptance of female feticide
August 9, 2012: An official in the Indian Catholic Church has endorsed the idea that
participants in sex-selective abortions should be charged with murder. The backing
by Holy Spirit Missionary Sister Helen Saldanha, secretary of the Catholic Bishops'
Conference of India Office for Women, comes as momentum builds to end female feticide,
a practice that finds families terminating a pregnancy because the child they are
expecting is a girl.
Filing criminal charges for killing a child in the womb
because of its sex would "change the killer attitude" toward girls in Indian society,
Sister Helen told Catholic News Service. Although the practice of sex-selective abortions
is illegal under Indian law, there is no provision for criminal prosecution. Recent
census statistics indicate that the practice appears to be widespread.
The
census data show that the national ratio of girls to boys younger than 6 years old
has dropped from 927 for every 1,000 boys in 2001 to 914 for every 1,000 boys in 2011.
In some states, the ratio dropped to 800 girls for every 1,000 boys, according to
the census. "Son preference is a major syndrome that is leading to a decline in the
ratio of girl children. Sadly, the advances in medical technology are being used to
prevent the birth of millions of unwanted girl children," Sister Helen said. Dr. Ruchika
Dewan Singh, manager for strategic planning of the Catholic Health Association of
India, acknowledged that sex selection is accepted across Indian society even though
laws make it illegal.
The call for mandatory murder charges for female feticide
has gained momentum in recent weeks. The plan was endorsed in July at a convention
of more than 300 leaders from village councils in northern Indian states where there
are now about 800 girls for every 1,000 boys. A similar call came a week later from
officials in Maharashtra state when they urged the national government to amend the
Indian Penal Code to require the filing of murder charges against parents as well
as physicians involved in female feticide.
The preference for boys is rooted
in Hindu culture and the achievement of "moksha," liberation, only when an individual
has a son to perform last rites as mandated by Hindu scripture. The practice is said
to have led to the dowry system that has led to the consideration that female children
are a financial liability for a family. The failure to meet dowry demands results
in the deaths of thousands of young women annually. The National Crime Records Bureau
recorded 8,391 dowry deaths -- women killed because of the failure to meet dowry demands
-- in 2010. The bureau also recorded more than 94,000 suicides among young women because
of dowry harassment by their husband or in-laws in 2010, up from 28,579 in 1995.
Singh
of the Catholic Health Association of India said technology has led to the rise in
sex-selective abortion as well as pre-conception sex selection. "With the advent of
modern technological procedures like amniocentesis and ultrasound, the sex of the
fetus can be easily identified within the first few months of pregnancy and this is
done with the intention of abortion if the fetus turns out to be female," she said.
Though sex-determination tests have been banned since 1994 under the Pre-Natal Diagnostic
Techniques Act, Singh acknowledged that such tests are widely carried out in India
by unscrupulous medical practitioners.
Apart from that, Singh noted that costly
techniques involving the selection of the sex of a child before conception are used
by affluent families. "Sometimes the (non-Christian) consultant doctors embarrass
us (Catholic health care workers), suggesting that our hospitals too should carry
out female feticide as the demand for it is very high," said Indian Missionary Father
Tomi Thomas, CHAI director general.
"We are facing the challenge of educating
even some of the medical community to shed the social prejudice against the girl child,"
Father Thomas said. CHAI is conducting regular training programs for health workers,
including village-level nursing assistants, to change the bias against girls and to
counsel couples not to indulge in female feticide. Sister Cletus Daisy, a member of
the Society of Jesus Mary Joseph and a physician in Orissa state, said that "sometimes
even educated couples approach us with the demand to abort the female fetus." "But
we counsel them and tell them, 'Don't abort. We will adopt the baby,'" she said.
Even
as gender prejudice against girls is much lower in the Christian community, the Catholic
Church in India has observed Sept. 8, the birthday of Mary, as a day to celebrate
girls since 1997 "to change the killer attitude against girl children," Sister Helen
said. The church, she said, introduced a "gender policy" that highlighted the plight
of girls in Indian society in 2009. Local dioceses also run programs that actively
campaign against sex-selective abortions, she said. "We have to do much more and make
use of our vast network of educational institutions to spread the message of the dignity
and equality of the girl child to non-Christian parents," Sister Helen said.