A couple of days ago, a baby girl was found on the pavement in India, wrapped in nothing but a plastic bag.
The nights in India have been getting colder as winter approaches, so police were alarmed to receive an anonymous call at 1am from someone who had found her – they had heard her cries from the street.
BBC News reports that police brought her in to the trauma centre of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), which has been her home for the past few days.
Dr Vinod Kumar Paul told BBC that when she arrived she was cold and had low blood sugar, but has since been treated.
“We have given her all the mandatory vaccines and since we know nothing about her history, we are testing her for any infections or birth defects,” Dr Paul said.
“The baby’s fine, she’s happy, she’s eating well, smiling.”
The case appears to be one of abandonment, something that is a huge problem in India at the moment. The cause for this is a traditional preference for sons over daughters, because of their ability to carry on the family name and the belief that they will be able to look after their parents when they get old.
According to data from the 2011 Census in India, for every 1000 boys born, only 927 girls were born – and the problem has only got worse with figures from earlier this year showing that this number is now down to 918.
Somnath Paruthi, the police officer who brought the baby to the trauma centre, is in disbelief that abandonment and infanticide is still so rampant.
“Recently when a young woman won an Olympic medal, Indians celebrated. And now we find a baby girl being dumped on the pavement to die. We are people with such double standards.”
The baby girl has been named Swadha, meaning ‘gift of God’.
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