Prerna - The girl child who survived

I pen this for Prerna. Who’s Prerna? She is the ill-fated, yet fortunate enough girl child who has survived to see this world by the sheer dint of her mother’s courage. Her mother willed and said no to the idea of killing her. Prerna owes her life to her mother, in more ways than one.

She was in the womb when her grandmother took her mother to a clinic for sex determination. The doctor said it was a she and that’s when began her mother’s ordeal. Her grandma decided she wanted nothing to do with a female child. What else is a female child other than a burden, a liability? First you have to feed her, educate her and then marry her off with substantial amount of dowry so that she doesn’t end up getting burnt to death or thrown out or maybe tortured endlessly and haggled by greedy in-laws. Her grandma wanted none of that; to nip her in the bud she had decided. It was her mother; resolute firm and unwavering that stood by her child’s right to live, first of all to be born unto this world with dignity. For her mother, she was just her child, gender regardless.

Her mother’s stance came at a price. She was forsaken by her husband and his family. For sustenance, she took up a job as a teacher (which didn’t come easy) and single handedly brought up her child. Today, Prerna goes to college and lives with zeal and enthusiasm amidst the penury that surrounds her; she manages to smile with pride. Her mother is her hero; for she just didn’t give her birth and hence, a life but actually “gave her a life by saving her from the clutches of death”.

For one such Prerna, there are many others who weren’t as lucky to see the light of the day. They died silent deaths – sometimes in the womb, sometimes in a tub of cold water, sometimes between two fingers that strangulated the tiny neck. And if the perpetrator had any mercy left, she was abandoned in the garbage bin or by the riverside or maybe a park. Many such Prernas live in the orphanages, who were chosen to be “orphaned” by their own parents and family.

Mankind and society cannot survive on the strength of the male population only. It’s not only against the Law of Nature but not possible as well for all practical purposes. The declining male-female ratio in India as recently published is one thing that the sleeping Govt. needs to sit up and take notice of. Of highest concern is the dwindling child male-female ratio; which has been reported to be the worst since India attained freedom 64 years back. Globally too, the ratio is on the decline. While Govts can enact laws against female feticide or sex determination or selective abortion, at the grass root level it is the responsibility of each individual to do away with this social evil that is deep-rooted in our psychology. Women are an integral part of the human society. Apart from the many socio-physiological reasons on why we need a stable sex ratio, the one that appeals to me most is – with no female child left, the human race itself will be on the verge of extinction since we definitely cannot depend on men to continue our progeny, can we? Woman only are gifted with the ability to create, until Nature or Science decides to alter that fact, we will remain dependant on the female mass to take us forward. So, please SAVE the GIRL CHILD.