12 Newborn girls abandoned in six months
On his way to a nearby temple, a priest heard cries coming from near some bushes. As he went near, he was shocked to find a newborn girl wrapped in a piece of cloth. The baby was apparently abandoned by her parents.
The baby managed to survive after she was admitted to the respiratory intensive care unit. The incident took place on September 18 at Karin Bagh on the outskirts of the city.
However, this is not an isolated case. For quite some time, Jammu is witnessing a distributing trend of abandoning newborn females within minutes of their birth so that they die without feed.
In the last six months, 12 such cases have come to the notice of the authorities even as many such incidents continue to go unnoticed.
“It is really a disturbing trend. For quite some time now, we have been noticing people abandoning their newborn baby girls,” Medical Superintendent of SMGS (Sri Maharaja Gulab Singh) Hospital Dr Dara Singh told .
“There is need to create awareness among masses. There are some people who are still opposed to a female child,” Dr Singh said.
The newborn baby girl spotted in the Karan Bagh area was fortunate, but many others are not.
A couple of months ago, a newborn baby girl was found dead near the Indira Chowk in the heart of the city.
On June 26, an unclaimed baby girl was found at Trikuta Nagar in Jammu.
On September 3, parents abandoned their newborn baby girl in the Bus Stand area of the city. A similar incident was registered in Udhampur in June.
The trend of abandoning girl child is giving sleepless nights to the authorities. In most of the cases, the police have failed to identify the parent of the dumped babies.
Since the authorities are keeping a strict vigil on illegal abortions people have adopted inhuman methods to kill baby girls.
Post 2011 Census, which registered a decrease in the male-female ratio in the state, the authorities had taken many measures to bridge the gap. Sex determination tests followed by illegal abortions were found to the main cause of an alarming decrease in the number of girls.
The juvenile sex ratio (0-6 years), which is the most realistic indicator of female foeticide and continuing discrimination against the girl child, has posed some serious questions to the states Health Department.
The state has witnessed a steep fall in the male-female sex ration during the last decade, especially the juvenile sex ratio.
In the year 2001, the sex ratio (0-6 years) was 941 against 1,000 males which came down to 859 in the year 2011. The national average of juvenile sex ratio is 914.
The current male female sex ratio in Jammu and Kashmir is 889 girls per 1,000 boys.
