Infanticide in India

One of my Indian colleague is going to be a dad soon.  I congratulated him and asked him is it a baby boy or baby girl.  To my surprise, he said he have no idea.  It turn out in India it is illegal for the doctor telling the parents the sex of the baby.  The India government have such a law is because killing unborn baby girls is quite common in India.  The male to female ratio in India is 93 to 100, which means 7 out of 100 men cannot find a wife.  The problem is so bad that the government have to pass laws in order to have more baby girls.

I know Indian discriminate against woman, but discrimination alone won’t explain the killing of baby girl.  Your son have to marry a woman when he grow up, if everyone only give birth to boy, where the wives come from?  It turn out there is a financial penalty of having baby girl.  In Indian tradition marriage, the parent of the bride has to give a large sum of money to the groom.  Some people even take out a loan so that their daughter can marry the guy they like.  Here is something does not make sense.  According to the law of supply and demand, there are not enough women for every men in India.  Women are short in supply and high in demand, their price should go up.  In a free market of getting marriage, the groom should pay the large sum to find the right bride.  In a long run, the Indian wedding tradition is due to change, nothing can defying the law of economics forever.

If I am an Indian parent, I rather my daughter remains daddy’s girl then paying a large sum to get her a husband.  Any guy asking money from the in-law are not suitable to be a good husband.  If the Indian wedding tradition is the cause of killing baby girls.  Forbidding the doctor telling the parent the sex of the baby only treat the symptoms, it is not fixing the problem.  Assume we have to work within the constraint of arranged marriage, maybe the government should setup an internet auction platform for match making and require all parents using the auction platform to arranged the marriage for their sons and daughters.  An open auction platform just like eBay will show the true market value of the bride.  Given the lack of women in India, the price signal should strong enough to reverse trend of killing baby girl.  There is also a plan B, the Indian government can simply legalize gay marriage.  For the 7 out of 100 poor men who can’t find a wife, they just marry another guy.

2 thoughts on “Infanticide in India”

  1. Horace, you have too much ‘water’ to blow…

    Makes me want to call you 喬寶寶 even more! 🙂 kekekee

  2. 印度人嘅重男輕女思想的確幾嚴重, 婚姻由父母作主, 而嫁妝卻係來自女方父母提供, 作為婚後生活嘅必用品, 送嘅禮越多, 女方在夫家嘅地位就越高. 因此, 印度人一旦屋企生咗一個女, 就要為女兒籌集一大筆錢, 若添了一個男仔, 那就是多了一個發財機會.

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