Female Infanticide in Urban India

For those who have read one of the recent issues of India today, the topic needs no explaination. For the rest, here is a brief introduction. The cover article of one of the issues of India today addresses the topic of the falling female to male ratios in 'urban' India, mostly in the NCR and Gujarath. Yes the emphasis is on the word 'urban' here. The falling rates are quite alarming. The study has been carefully undertaken with the correct statistics and figures. (I dont have a copy of the magazine to recollect the exact figures). Now how does this affect the 'Indian' psyche and why is that I am so concerned about this alarming rate and why have I titled this blog as 'female infanticide' though there is no actual killing involved.
First, why 'infanticide'. The study undertaken by the magazine says that most of the urban Indian women ( in the age group 23 -35) do not want to give birth to a female child. Now how on earth do they know that they are going to give birth to a female child. Should I say thanks to the 'sex determination tests' of the foetuses. By determining the sex of the unborn child, women undergo abortion to 'remove' the unwanted 'female foetus'. Now this is why I term this as 'infanticide'. If not killing the child after it has been born, these 'women' are 'terminating' them much earlier. Nothing to be surprised at the fact that sex determination of a child before it is born is 'illegal' in this country. The clinics that offer these sex determination tests also offer 'foolproof and healthy' methods of abortion. These factors are leading to what I term as 'premature killing' of the girl child.
What concerns me more is just the fact that the 'urban' women do not want a female child. These women who recieve the best education, work in some of the best organizations still have a craving for a male child. They themselves are not able to remove the stigma attached to womanhood in this country. Women speak about equality, about their safety, about culture and what not. What are all these talks for ? to prove that they are willing to kill a girl who is supposed to be born and keep getting laid until they 'bear' a male child. When there is no law to even recognize that killing a 'female unborn' child or for that matter any child is an offence, of what good are the laws that punish terrorists who commit genocide.
My interpretation of the falling ratio of females to males: If this ratio continues to decline, it will attain such low levels as (2:10 or 3:10 ), just imagine the state of the males. For every 10 males, there will be only 3 females :). Oops such a gross imbalance. The effect on the male psyche will be enormous. This will eventually lead to an increase in 'desire to possess' a woman amongst males (since there are less women and every man has to satisfy his lust for a woman ). This desire might further lead to various crimes against women, molestation, harrasments, rapes. ( This interpretation is a mere possiblilty and the reasoning could be flawed). Now what about women. they will feel so suppressed in a society that has 70% males. The 'divide' between males and females will further grow instead of bieng narrowed down.
When a dumb guy like me can sit and think all these plausibilities, cant the 'urban women' who are supposedly much much more mature, think about the implications of killing a girl child. These women might be taking such drastic steps, owing to the societal difficulties they would have faced in their lives and thinking that their offsprings might also have to go through the same. That is still not a satisfactory explaination and such an explaination can be rather termed as an xcuse.
Somehow, I just hope that this practice of killing these unborn infants stops. Am just reminded of the 'missionaries of charity' , where nuns give life to such unborn infants.
The women can atleast 'deliver' the unwanted child and leave it at the mercy of these nuns.

Vacation

I will be on vacation till the next wednesday. Plan to sit at home, relax, read, and catch on with all that I've missed so far ..

Question

Is love driven by lust or lust driven by love ??

Espionage and Military Intelligence

Was following an Article . It mainly talks about spies and the gadgetry. For reasons unknown, whenever I read about the accomplishments of westeners, I tend to think what was lacking in us Indians then, that prevented us from attaining these accomplishments. Same applies to 'independence'. When America attained its independence sometime in the 18th century, we Indians were busy fighting amongst ourselves and unknowingly letting others take over us. America attained its independence not only by the means of war, but by intelligence and espionage. It was the American spies who foiled most of the British attempts of victory. Most of the success is attributed to intelligence. The same has been carried forward. Even though there have been minor pitfalls, even today CIA is ranked on top of the world's secret service organizations next to MOSSAD.
Its a matter of apathy that India, home to Kautilya, one of the greatest espionage and intelligence experts of all times, fell into the hands of foriegners. Speaking about Kautilya, he single handedly threw away the Nandas and established the Mauryan dynasty as the single largest kingdom in the country. But for his intelligence, Chandragupta Maurya would have never got back his kingdom. Never to forget the intelligence of Amathya Rakshasa. No we cannot blame the generations for not having picked up their knowledge. Kautilya put most of his thoughts and skills in the book 'Arthashasthra', supposedly the bible for political science. History should have a positive growth, but Indian history has shown a potentially negative growth. The country has been invaded by various rulers, starting from Alexander, but it was the Europeans, mainly the British who succeeded in ruling this country. They succeeded not because of their might, but because of their political intelligence. They saw the weakness in the Indian rulers and slowly devoured one after the other.
Had we Indians inherited the knowledge of Kautilya, Amathya Rakshasa and the like, probably we could have prevented the British, probably the first war of independence would have given us the true independence. That mistake has cost us so much that, even 50 years after our independence, our military abilities stands no where in comparison with the super powers. Indian intelligence agencies have no recognition on a global scale. We have not been able to resolve problems with our neighbours, and we are still a developing nation filled with corruption. In today's world of military intelligence and espionage India stands nowhere. The Indian intelligence agencies IB and RAW are probably unheard of.

Last week was full of partying, lunches, outings, meetings and absolutely 'NO WORK'. Thanks to our managers :). This week, its again back to the grind.

Psst.. Did 'Matrix Revolutions' make any sense ... ??? someone xplain...

Lake Samiti

The most romantic place I have ever visited in my life. It was in late April that I visited this lake. Still the memories are so vivid I can write pages and pages describing this lake. In the state of Sikkim. Lake Samiti is situated in the himalayas at a height of 16,000 ft and sarrounded by snow clad peaks. Just the very sight of this lake is blissful. We trekked for nearly 3 days, a distance of almost 40 kms, and finally all that seemed fruitful. On reaching the log hut, which is around 100 metres from the lake, I just threw my backpack and went to the lake. What a blissful sight.
I could just sit by the side of the lake for hours, just looking at the pristine blue waters. Just fell in love with the place. Added to this beauty, was a lone duck in the lake. Wading through the waters, the duck was all to its own self, perhaps relishing every moment in that lake. No one to disturb him, no one to bother him, no one to be bothered about, the duck was merrily wading through the expanse of the lake.
Apart from one or two occasional yakmen, not a soul can be seen in this region. All the sound that can be heard is the gushing sound of the ever blowing winds, and the clinker of the trinkets tied to the yaks' neck. Sitting by the edge of the lake, Watching the snow clad peaks, gazing at the lone duck generating ripples as he wades through the water, feeling the cold of the winds blowing across the face, I was just lost. The lake is not very big, perhaps an average swimmer can swim across the lake without any difficulty.
I was so wonderstruck at the sight of the lake, I didnt even feel like disturbing the waters. Sometimes at the sight of an object of utmost beauty, I dont feel like even touching it, fearing that my touch might spoil the beauty of the object. The same happened with Lake Samiti also. The freezing cold further prevented me from venturing into the water.
The mouth of the lake leads to a stony path to go to Goche-La, the highest point from where Mt.KanchenZhonga can be seen from a very short distance. The photograph was taken from this path, some 500 metres away from the lake. My so called photography skills havent captured the lake in its true form. Neverthe less this photo was the best I could get, given the limitations of my skills as well as the camera. If I happen to fall in love with someone, all I would wish for is to spend sometime with her at lake Samiti.