The British first discovered female infanticide in India in 1789. Jonathan Duncan, then the resident in Benares province was asked by the Bengal council to settle the revenues in the province acquired by the raja of Benares.

Demographic literature is replete with observations of an inverse relation between certain attributes of modernity and family size (Thompson 1929; Notestein 1945; Coale and Hoover 1958; Leiberman 1980, Srinivasan 1986).

A fear of female sexuality and therefore, the need to control it have been felt in many societies and civilizations. This control has assumed different forms in different societies.