Midwifery Siro Devi was almost in tears as she hugged Monica Thatte. Since her thirties, Monica has again come to the small town in India where Siro used to midwife hundreds of babies. However, there was more to the reunion than met the eye. Siro & other midwives like her, who have been doing this kind of work in the past. Had to concede and kill hundreds of girl babies. As history so indicates, Monica was one of those girls rescued from them.
A Dark Chapter in Bihar’s History Monica
The first time I met Siro and four other midwives was in Bihar, India in the year 1996. At that time the non government organization recognized them as perpetrators of killing phenomenon of juvenile females in Katihar district. These midwives were coerced and blackmailed by relatives who dreaded the expense of dowry for their children making them feel obliged to kill. Some of the midwives, including the infamous Hakiya Devi, confessed that they killed over 12 or 13 babies; while this other midwife Dharmi Devi, even claimed to have personally accounted for more than 15-20. It’s easy to imagine how many babies were really killed but according to some NGO reports from 1995 in one district at least 1000 girls infants were killed every year due to 35 active midwives.
Pressure and Fear Monica
It was an almost impossible task resisting the urge to kill a newborn. Hakiya recalled families locking the room and threatening hands with sticks if midwives refused. “They would say: ‘We already have too many daughters and risk of starvation does not justify giving dowries. So kill her,’” Hakiya said. Within such a community, where one would find midwives with little power, they tried to avoid punishment from the upper-caste families to whom they catered. Even trying to get police assistance was risky because the midwives themselves would be held accountable for the murders.
Poverty, Caste, and Dowry
There were sociological factors such as culture, and underdevelopment that defined the position of midwives in rural India. It was common for midwives to be from the lower castes and within the profession the family tradition continued. There was absolute obedience in the face of powerful family orders because resisting such orders was beyond one’s imagination and at the end of the day there were higher gains in terms of the payment for the delivery for a boy than for a girl. Midwives earned 1000 rupees for the delivery of a boy but only half that amount for a girl.
The inequity in gender at birth ratio can largely be attributed to the dowry system in India. Even though the offering of dowries was prohibited in 1961, practices of awarding dowries still persisted making the arrival of a daughter a cost effective to looking after the infant.
Flashing Red Light Siro
Siro Devi, one of the last midwives who participated in my original interviews. Illustrates this deep-seated inequality using words that remain clear in one’s minds long after. For those midwives, the transition from killing infant girls to protecting them has been painful and convoluted.
