-The Hindu   Even as the debate over the inclusion of human rights activist Binayak Sen in the Planning Commission's steering committee on health still continues, the first meeting of the committee — that will guide the panel on drafting the 12 {+t} {+h} Plan — has been re-scheduled due to the non-availability of a large number of members on Wednesday. The meeting has now been fixed for June 22 as most...

Selective abortion of girls in India prevented about 4.2 million to 12.1 million girls from being born between 1980 and 2010, with the largest number of girls being aborted in the 1990s, a latest survey has shown. Selective abortion of girls, especially for pregnancies after a firstborn girl, has increased substantially in India. Most of India's population now lives in States where selective abortion is common, says the study “Trends in...

-The Telegraph   India’s gains in literacy and prosperity are, contrary to expectations, driving an increase in the number of female foeticide cases with selective abortion after a first child highest in wealthy, educated households, says a study released today. The study by a team of Indian and Canadian researchers has shown a steep decline in the ratio of girls to boys in India when the first-born child is a girl. And...

-The Hindustan Times   Rich and educated Indian parents are increasingly aborting a second girl child and instead waiting for a boy, driving 90% of the country’s citizens into zones with sex ratios that are unnaturally and often dangerously low. The sex ratio for second-born children in families where the first-born is a girl has dropped overall from 906 girls per 1000 boys in 1990 to 836 in 2005, new research published in...

-IANS   Even rich and educated Indian families with a girl as the first child choose to abort their second child if prenatal test shows it to be a girl, said a study released by Centre for Global Health Research (CGHR) here Tuesday. According to the study: 'Analysis of the trends examined from the statistics of the census of year 2011, 2001, 1991 note a sharp decline in the girl-to-boy sex ratio...