72 South Asia: Population Geog I – Proverbs and Son Preference
“The world will not conquer him who is always rubbing his beard.”
- South Asian proverb
Across the world, proverbs tell something about culture, about the ways of life and the points of views of ethnic groups and countries. In South Asia, in particular in India, proverbs speak to the attitudes towards the female gender. Consequences of son preference in India are profound, culturally and demographically.
In 2020, the sex ratio for the whole of India was 108. That means that there were 108 males for every 100 females in the country. The sex ratio, nearly universally, is represented as the number of males per 100 females in the population. Usually, the sex ratio is measured for a country, but it could be calculated for any region. The sex ratio statistic is quite flexible, as long as it is applied to the same sub-category of the population. For instance, the sex ratio could be stated for children 0-6 years old. That would be boys 0-6 years old per 100 girls 0-6 years old. Very oddly, India presents the sex ratio statistic differently, as females per 1000 males.
The sex ratio of 108 for a whole country is impossible without societal intervention. Biologically, the sex ratio declines at every age, meaning that more males than females die at every age of life. This is even true before birth. Biologically, the sex ratio at birth is about 105, giving males a natural head start that is crucial, considering the mortality disadvantage that males have. Given that the highest category of sex ratio is at birth at 105, it is impossible for a country to have an overall sex ratio higher than 105. This means that society is changing patterns of birth and death in India.
Historically, this is not new in India, but has been going on for generations. Actually, the cause – son preference – is not new nor limited to India. Son preference can be found throughout history across the globe; nevertheless, India is one of the contemporary countries where this effect remains significant.
The problem of son preference in India is seen in a concept called daughter elimination. This practice finds expression in a few different ways. Historically and still used today, female infanticide happens when the girl baby is killed and buried shortly after birth. This strategy of son preference was direct and required no technology.
Modern India favors the technological solution of gender-based abortion. Ultrasound testing is a common medical procedure using across much of the world to check for birth defects in the early development of the unborn child. A bonus feature of ultrasound testing is the ability to discern the sex of the child. In India, this makes it simple to choose abortion to prevent a girl from being born. The numbers of these types of abortion now exceeds the numbers of infant girls killed, having begun to change in the 1970s.
A lesser practice is simple neglect. A girl will be born and raised, but poorly. Quality and quantity of food will be poor and low. Medical care will be withheld. Perhaps the death of the girl can seem uncaused.
Why does son preference hold such sway as to prompt daughter elimination? Of course, there are the usual notions of continuing the family name and bloodline, as well as securing the advantage of greater strength for manual labor or agricultural work. These ideas are common historically and in different parts of the world. Even so, are things different in India?
Indeed, one aspect of son preference in India is the economic value of women. Research suggests that in rougher agricultural areas of India, places where wheat fields are plowed with a manually-held tool pulled behind a cow, display inflated sex ratios (more men than women). Male strength has an economic value there.
Additionally and more distinctively, the dowry system skews the sex ratio. Though the dowry system has been discredited officially and illegal since 1961, it is nearly universally practiced in India. The dowry requires the bride’s family to pay for the privilege of marrying off their daughter. One study in India found that the rates of the dowry have remained relatively stable for a few decades now, averaging about 14% of the bride’s parents’ annual income. Obviously, it is financially beneficial to be on the groom’s side of this monetary equation.
Thus, the South Asian proverb – “Having a daughter is like, watering your neighbor’s garden.”
Another factor in India is termed village exogamy. Particularly among the rural villages of India, there is the habit of the bride leaving her village to go live with the groom in his village. This may be particularly uncomfortable for the bride in the common cases of arranged marriage, for the bride will leave everything familiar of family and location to go live in a new unfamiliar location where she lacks social connections. Like the agricultural disparities, this practice is more common in northern India. A different aspect of the path of marriage is the social direction of class or caste. Having a daughter who can only manage to marry down in status or caste can be viewed as being worse than having a daughter at all.
Thus, the South Asian proverb – “Daughters and cows go wherever they are led.”
To wrap it up, the South Asian proverb – “The birth of a girl, grant it elsewhere. Here grant a son.”
The consequence is the imbalance of males and females in India, particularly so in several northern states. Clearly, there is a seriously debilitating effect on women and girls; however, there is one very ironic consequence for males. With the shortage of women in India, many young men, indeed millions, are unable to find brides or must expend great efforts to find a marriage. A 25 year-old Indian man might be unable to find a 25 year-old Indian woman to marry, because she was aborted those many years ago. This circumstance is called a marriage squeeze.
Did you know?
What does the proverb about beards have to do with son preference? Probably nothing, but since both the textbook authors sport beards, they like this proverb. However, the illustration is of a Sikh man. In the Sikh region of the Punjab, sex ratios favor males too.
Note that in America, it remains very common that the bride’s parents pay for most of the wedding expenses. The difference between America and India in this regard is that in America the bride’s parents pay for expenses, but do not pay the groom’s family.
Surprisingly, in 2021 the National Family Health Survey in India reported that there are more females than males in the country. This report was widely criticized, in part for making this claim based on only 0.2% of households nationwide. In the 2011 census, there were only 940 females for every 1000 males, while the ratio of children 0-6 years old had only 918 girls for every 1000 boys; indeed, it is impossible for the sex ratio to now favor females in India.
Refer back to Chapter 18 for a different aspect of the sex ratio.
Cited and additional bibliography:
de Pril, Anniek. Raising a Daughter Is like Watering Your Neighbors’ Garden. Radboud University, 2008.
India Sex Ratio 2021 – StatisticsTimes.Com. https://statisticstimes.com/demographics/country/india-sex-ratio.php#:~:text=Gender%20ratio%20in%20India&text=In%202020%2C%20the%20sex%20ratio,to%2051.96%20percent%20male%20population.
“NFHS: Does India Really Have More Women than Men?” BBC News, 27 Nov. 2021. www.bbc.com, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-59428011.
