India needs daughters. Families want sons. What’s a ‘balanced’ approach?
When Satyajit Jadeja’s wife went into labor last December, the couple knew they were going to have twins, though their gender was still a mystery. The family was happy when Mr. Jadeja’s wife delivered two healthy baby girls, but one girl and one boy would have been ideal, he says.
“It’s not that we are biased,” Mr. Jadeja quickly clarifies. “But when you think of the future, it is essential [to have a boy], because the girl goes [to another family] after marriage.” Sons, he says, act as a support system for aging parents.
A pervasive preference for sons has led India to have one of the most skewed sex ratios in the world, with approximately 108 men for every 100 women. that India misses out on nearly 400,000 female births a year due to sex selection. The Indian government tried to end sex-selective abortions in 1994 by making it illegal to reveal the sex of a fetus, but the practice persists, and now the country’s booming and largely unregulated market of in vitro fertilization clinics is offering a new avenue for guaranteeing a son.
