Skewed Sex Ratio in Asia: Consequences and Concerns

Abstract

Worsening sex ratios is bound to have a devastating effect on the human civilization. It encompasses a wide range of human rights violations, including sexual abuse of children, rape, domestic violence, sexual assault and harassment, trafficking of women and girls and several harmful traditional practices. The crime rate has almost doubled in China during the past 20 years of rising sex ratios, with stories abounding of bride abduction, the trafficking of women, rape and prostitution. A study into whether these things were connected concluded that they were, and that higher sex ratios accounted for about one-seventh of the rise in crime. In India, too, there is a correlation between provincial crime rates and sex ratios. There have been reports from the northwest, where the sex-ratio imbalance is worse, of rape and sex crime on the rise. Decades of unchecked sex-selective abortions have made the once fertile States of Punjab and Haryana suffer a drought of brides, making human-trafficking a lucrative and expanding trade. Author in this article explains the consequences and concerns of skewed sex ratio and tries to explore the correlations between skewed sex ratio & reported crimes against women across Asia.