India’s missing girls: separating birth ratios, neglect and excess deaths

More than one form of discrimination

An unequal number of men and women in a population does not reveal a single cause. Sex selection before birth, unequal survival after birth, migration and age structure are different processes. Discussions of India's missing girls often collapse them into one claim about infanticide, losing the distinctions that researchers use to identify harm.

A 2018 Lancet Global Health study by Christophe Guilmoto and colleagues analysed India's 2011 census to estimate excess mortality among girls under five in 2000–05. The central estimate was about 239,000 excess deaths annually, with a reported uncertainty interval of 169,000 to 293,000. These are estimates for a historical period, not a measurement of deaths in 2026.

What excess mortality means

The researchers compared observed mortality patterns with expected patterns derived from countries without evidence of gender bias in survival. Excess mortality means deaths above that estimated baseline. It is not a register of individual killings and cannot be relabelled as a count of babies deliberately murdered. Unequal food, care and treatment can affect survival without appearing as a recorded homicide.

The study also found major geographical differences. Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh accounted for about two-thirds of the estimated excess deaths. The authors emphasised that the map of disadvantage after birth did not match the map of unusually male-biased births. A national average cannot describe every state, district or household.

Birth ratios measure a different problem

Pew Research Center's separate 2022 analysis examined sex ratios at birth. It reported a narrowing imbalance across census and survey sources, from roughly 111 boys per 100 girls in the 2011 census to 108 in the 2019–21 National Family Health Survey. These figures measure births, not the later survival of those children. Differences between datasets and time periods also need to remain visible.

The evidence supports a serious account of discrimination, without treating every family as identical or substituting a shocking number for its definition. Measuring the problem accurately helps distinguish the responses it requires: equal access to nutrition and health care, protection against neglect and violence, and changes to the social pressures that make daughters less valued.