indian council of medical research - Pondicherry University DSpace ...

tremendous Increase in the enrollment rate to ach~eve the goal of "Educat~on for all by
2000 AD" Despite thls. In some of the developing wuntnes l~ke Afghantsten, Nepal,
Bhutan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigena and Morocw, the female l~teracy IS only half of
male literacy (UNICEF 1995) On an average, globally, only 68 0% of the girls who are
enrolled ~n school reach grade V In developed countnes, the f~gures are between
94 0%-100 09'0, whlle In develop~ng wuntnes ~t IS much lower, ranging from 40 0%-
83 0% Snlanka IS the only develop~ng country ~n Asla, where 95 0% of the girls who
are enrolled ~n school reach grade V In our nelghbonng countnes of Bhutan, Pakistan,
and Bangladesh, the figures are 11 0%, 280% and 450% respect~vely (UNICEF
1994a)
7 2.2 Indian Scenario
[a) Gender preference in having children
In general, there IS a broad concern for the status of the g~rl ch~ld In lnd~a There IS a
des~re to have at least one son ~n the fam~ly, though not to the same extent ~n all parts
of the wuntry Over the years, wth a tendency to l~m~t the fam~ly slze, there has been
an Increase in arnn~ocentes~s and abohon of female fetus
In 1984, a survey ln
Bombay revealed that out of 8,000 abortions reported only one was a male and In one
year about 40,000 female fetus were aborted (Mukher)ee,l991) The sex ratlo (number
Of females for every thousand males) In India (1991 census) is 927 (Park,1997)
However a heterogene~ty is observed In the sex ratlo, wth some states rep0rtlng a
h~gher rabo than others Kerala IS the only state ~n lnd~a w~th a sex ratto of 1,040
Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka. Tam11 Nadu and Hlmachal Pradesh report a sex ratlo
between 950 and 1,000, and the other stales, below 950 Haryana records the lowest