Early Times Report
JAMMU, Dec 19: As the global population hits seven billion, experts are warning that skewed sex ratios could fuel the emergence of volatile "bachelor nations" driven by an aggressive competition for brides.
While there has been a marginal increase in the country's sex ratio from 933 in 2001 to 940 in 2011, significant variations still exist among the J&K State, with an adverse ratio.
As per the records, the sex ratio stands at 883 females for 1000 males in the state, as per 2011 census, showing a distinct decline from that in the year 2001 that gauged 892 females for 1000 males in the State.
"Even if the sex ratio at birth returned to normal in the upcoming years, men in the State would still face a 'marriage squeeze' for decades to come," says Dr Bhawna Gupta, a physician/psychologist.
"A recent research also shows that not only would these men have to marry significantly older, but this growing marriage imbalance would lead to a rapid rise in male bachelorhood, an important change in countries, where almost everyone used to get married," she added.
How that change might manifest itself is hotly debated, although nearly everyone agrees there is no predictable upside.
The State Government has also claimed that flexible laws in the State were responsible for an extensive decline in child sex ratio, which has been defusing the efforts to control the menace of female foeticide.
"The law that seeks to punish sex determination is rendered ineffective because of the 'liberal' Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, which allows abortion on grounds of mental trauma," said Minister for Health Sham Lal Sharma while replying to a query on this declining sex ratio.
"Both the parties, the doctors who were motivated by money and the women who were probably coerced by family and social pressures, were equally responsible for the crime," Sharma added.
Sham Lal also said that they are going to take strict measures to check this trend. |
