Revisitng Phool Devi, a midwife, who told us 5 years ago that she had killed over 65 infant girls.
Mysteriously, another terminator of female babies, sexagenarian Hakiya Devi, too lost her adolescent son this year. It’s the revenge of the mean God, she says. As a means of redemption, she and Phool have become active workers of an organisation called Bal Mahila Kalyan (bmk) which, in a pleasant twist of fate, strives to eradicate female infanticide. Today when a ‘client’ approaches these women to kill a girl child, they quickly inform BMK.
Ever since we carried the story five years ago, the system has tried to be harsh with murderous midwives. However, female infanticide has not vanished from the state. What has changed is the fee and the process. From Rs 50 per murder, the fee today is Rs 100-150. And today the murder chiefly happens at the foetus stage. We learn this when we meet another midwife—or dai as they are called. Bago Devi, who has also reformed and joined bmk, says, "Now most of the cases we (bmk) get are the 3-4 month old cases. I tell people who approach me that if you cannot bring her up, give the girl to me, I’ll take care of her. But they simply get the work done by other dais."
Out there on the killing fields, we learn another bitter truth. A sophisticated form of female infanticide is today committed by the more refined, white coats in nursing homes. "There are many nursing homes that have come up in Katihar town who do this clandestinely," says a midwife called Anila Kumari. So, today, in many ways nothing has changed. It’s just that nursing homes specialising in ‘safe deliveries’ also extend the services of their morgue to some clueless female babies who deserve to live.