A significant step towards preventing female foeticide and child marriage
13-year-old Rubaya Khan aspires to be an engineer. She has made the decision that she won’t get married until she begins working. In the sixth grade, she got the first installment of Rs 2000 and hopes that the money she would get in the next years under the Ladli Laxmi Yojana (LLY) will assist her in achieving her academic and professional goals.
16-year-old Namrata Kewat aspires to be a doctor. She had seen her father, a daily wager, struggle mightily to make ends meet. She claims that the LLY has preserved her dreams. According to her, little efforts like these might result in significant transformation.
After giving birth to her second daughter, Krishna Malviya, 37, had herself sterilised. Her two daughters are listed as LLY members. She is not concerned about not having a son. She notes, noting LLY’s efforts to empower her girls, “Both my daughters are like my boys.
Kashish Malviya, 16, is interested in either becoming a banker or a teacher. Her dream’s plot was heavily influenced by the LLY. She remembers how, when she was in sixth grade, her family went through a really difficult financial period. Because of the money she received from LLY, her studies did not suffer.
The Ladli Laxmi Yojana (LLY) in Madhya Pradesh, an initiative motivated by the belief that investing in women and girls is an investment in the people and positive development, has benefited more than 44 lakh individuals. These four tales represent the wide-ranging effect of this programme. Since its inception in 2007, the program’s goal has been to improve the family’s economic and educational standing in order to empower girls and their families. Since its inception, it has contributed to a positive shift in society’s perception of girl babies.
Along with promoting social empowerment, LLY has been instrumental in reducing child marriage, female foeticide, and increasing the enrollment of girls in school and the gender ratio in the state. Empowering and educating the state’s females so they may contribute equally to progressive objectives has required a strategic new attitude. The state’s social infrastructure has changed as a result of this wide range.
inspiring the girl
Since its inception, it has contributed to a positive shift in society’s perception of girl babies. The girl covered by the programme receives Rs 2000 at entering 6th grade, Rs 4000 upon entering 9th grade, Rs 6,000 upon entering 11th grade, and Rs 6,000 upon entering 12th grade. When the girl becomes 21, she will get Rs. 1 lakh, bringing the total amount spent on each kid to Rs. 18,000 at that point. The girl’s parents should be Madhya Pradesh natives and not income tax payers, and she should have been born after January 1, 2006. More than 44 lakh people have benefited from this incentive, which has completely changed the game for girls in the state.
The recipient of the Ladli Laxmi Yojana 2, which was introduced in November 2022, receives a scholarship of Rs 25,000 for graduate education, which would be paid out in two equal installments over the course of two years.
A significant step towards reducing child marriage
Child marriage and the persistence of poverty through generations are strongly related. A girl who is coerced into an early marriage will stop attending school, which will harm her chances of independence and economic growth. Child marriage interferes with a girl’s right to the best possible health and is linked to early, haphazardly spaced, recurring pregnancies and births. According to research, females who get married young are far more likely to uphold conventional beliefs, maintain traditional gender roles, and pass these standards onto their own offspring. Child marriage should be scrutinised since it is linked to other issues including dowry killings and sex trafficking.
Between 2015–16 and 2019–21, the percentage of women aged 20–24 who were forced into child marriage decreased nationwide by 3.5% (from 26.8% to 23.3%). Positively, Madhya Pradesh had a bigger decrease (9.3%) throughout the same time period (from 32.4% to 23.1%).
Less than one-fourth (23%) of Madhya Pradesh women aged 20 to 24 were married before turning the legal minimum age of 18 according to the National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5), the most current survey in the series. This is a decrease from 32 percent during 2015–16 and 57% during 2005–06. The LLY, which emphasises a girl’s capacity for independence, has sparked a social revolution.
Another, if minor accomplishment was the drop in child marriage victims in the state from 5 in 2020 to 4 in 2021. This is optimistic in light of the fact that the number of victims nationwide increased by 34%, from 792 in 2020 to 1,062 in 2021.
Teenage pregnancy has decreased nationally from 7.9 percent in 2015–16 to 6.8 percent in 2019–21, which is basically an indirect reflection of child marriage. In Madhya Pradesh, the similar decline during the same time period was from 7.3 percent to 5.1 percent.
celebrating a girl’s birth
Female foeticide, or the sex-selective abortion of girls, has alarmingly increased the “gender gap” in India. Several demographic, sociological, and ethical issues are related to female foeticide. Indian patriarchal views are at the basis of sex-selective abortions and female foeticide. Studies have shown that this practise is also used by the wealthy and privileged, despite the fact that it has often been assumed to be more common among the poor and uneducated. Many times, the emergence of sex-selective abortion is portrayed as a straightforward instance of patriarchal, sexist civilizations abusing contemporary technology. This viewpoint is influenced by a lack of education among women, a lack of female leadership, and unfavourable assumptions about women as “economic burdens”.
The only way to address such a complicated issue is to address its underlying causes, which include unequal benefits, a lack of job possibilities, and lax enforcement of the law. By providing opportunities for the girl-child, the LLY has shifted the momentum in the correct direction. In order to end the practise, a comprehensive intervention at the political, institutional, cultural, and individual levels has been established since female foeticide cannot be handled in isolation.
According to official statistics, there were 18 cases of foeticide-related fatalities in 2010, but that number rose to 38 in 2011 (a rise of 111.1%). When compared to 2011, this increased by 68.4%, reaching 64 in 2012. However, between 2014 and 2021, there was a 10% decrease in the overall number of cases of foeticide reported in Madhya Pradesh, going from 30 to 27.
While there is no one type of female foeticide, girls make up the majority of the victims. Therefore, an improvement in the situation signals hope in the fight against the social ill.
difficult canvas
There has been a societal transformation as a result of the voyage that began in 2007. But there are still a lot of obstacles to overcome. A proper record of the beneficiaries’ selection must exist. It must be guaranteed that the recipients are real and satisfy all social and economic requirements. Stronger oversight and monitoring are required. To spread awareness of the programme in places where it hasn’t fully taken hold, a new communication plan has to be developed. The grassroots volunteers should continuously keep an eye on the recipients’ academic progress.
This is the first step on the path to closing the gender gap and promoting social cohesion.
(Author: Prof. Sachin Chaturvedi, Vice Chairman, AIGGPA. Professor Sachin Chaturvedi focuses on themes connected to development economics, including SDGs, South-South Cooperation, and development financing, in addition to trade, investment, and innovation linkages with an emphasis on WTO.)