Violence against women is legitimized by social norms, beliefs and institutions.

Decades of campaigning has led to signiicant changes and reform in the rape law.

Women experience disadvantage and oppression differentially, based on their status, context and location.

While it is laudable that the Indian government has made the effort to initiate a holistic reproductive health programme, its failure to address issues of sexuality that arise in this context is puzzling.

The high female infant mortality rates (Miller, 1985); the practice of female infanticide (Krishnaswamy, 1988); the neglect of female children with regard to access to health services, nutrition, (Sen and Sengupta, 1983 and education (Mankekar, 1985); and the sexual abuse of girls (Bhalerao, 1985

We use data from the 1981 and 1991 censuses of India to examine (a) sex ratios among infants aged under 2, (b) child mortality (q5) by sex, and (c) estimated period sex ratios at birth (SRB) calculated by reverse survival methods, to see whether bias against female children pers