Birth right

Sociologist B.A. Dabla attributes the state8217;s strides towards a better sex ratio to women8217;s empowerment. 8220;Women8217;s participation in the workforce is no longer taboo. This, in turn, has undermined the cultural notion of boys being the only earning members,8221; says Dabla. While his explanation works for urban areas, it fails the reality check in Hanijk.

For, given the laudatory rise, it8217;s odd that the village dismisses it with a diffidence laced heavily with stoicism. 8220;Our village has always had more women. We take girls as a blessing from God,8221; says 70-year-old Muhammad Mir, who has five daughters, all married, and two sons with three daughters each.

The stoicism is rooted in ravaging poverty, the diffidence in the inability to overcome the accident of birth. It8217;s not a planned achievement; reaching the target has been more a matter of chance than choice. 8220;It isn8217;t easy having a large number of daughters,8221; says Mir. 8220;In the grinding poverty in which we live, girls are a liability. It8217;s difficult to marry them because we can8217;t afford the dowry.8221;

His opinion finds an echo across the village. 8220;We aren8217;t against girls. We are concerned about the social customs which make them a burden, and there8217;s little we can do about it,8221; says Raheti, a 55-year-old mother of three daughters.

With a modest 27 per cent literacy in the 15-35 age group, Hanjik is on the margins of the Valley8217;s developmental map. So far, it has had only four graduates, all men, with the first graduate, Manzoor Ahmad Sofi, acquiring his degree only in 2003. On the other hand, Meema Akhter, the highest qualified girl at Hanjik, is a matriculate and works as an anganwadi worker.

Besides the subsistence-level farming, carpet weaving is the main source of income at Hanjik. In fact, each household has its own independent carpet weaving unit involving every member of the family. It has sustained the village8217;s economy for years and girls have been its inevitable lifeline. They have also been the unwitting victims, trying to make ends meet even as boys have been sent to school.

Nazia Akhter, 25, has been weaving carpets with her four sisters since she was four. 8220;My parents are poor so we couldn8217;t go to school, but our two brothers have studied till the primary level,8221; says Akhter, spreading out her scarred hands.

The inexorable, vicious cycle runs through each successive generation. So as Akhter and her husband earn a measly Rs 50 a day, they send only their four-year-old son to school and keep the older daughter at home. 8220;I8217;m already worried about my daughter. I have to put away Rs 10 every day for her dowry. So why shouldn8217;t I prefer a son?8221; she asks remorselessly. And if she had enough money, she would have aborted the female foetus. Akhter8217;s stance is not an anomaly; it8217;s the rule.

It8217;s reflected in the boy-girl ratio at Hanjik8217;s government primary school. 8220;We8217;re trying hard to retain the girls, even providing books and uniforms to the poorest,8221; says Sofi who teaches for a paltry Rs 1,500 per month. 8220;If our village leads in women population, why hasn8217;t there been a plan or scheme to uplift us? Almost all the women are illiterate,8221; says Sofi.