In some good news for the state, Maharashtra's sex ratio at birth has shown a slight rise to end at the healthiest in six years, indicating that the number of girls being born is on a gradual rise.
In 2013, the sex ratio at birth was just 900, which improved to 914 in 2014 but in 2015, marginally dipped to 907. The birth registration figures for 2016 and 2017 stand at 904 and 913 respectively. These have improved to 916 in the latest estimation for 2018.
However, last year, while the number of girls born in urban areas of Maharashtra was 920, which is higher than the state's average, the figure for rural areas was at a much lower 902 girl children per 1,000 boys born.
According to the state public health department's civil registration system's (CRS) figures, Sindhudurg in the Konkan has the healthiest sex ratio at birth (965), followed by tribal-dominated Nandurbar in North Maharashtra (954) and Ratnagiri (953). However, districts at the bottom of the heap include Buldhana (857), Kolhapur (870) and Jalna (879).
Mumbai's sex ratio at birth based on registered events is 939, while that for Thane, Palghar, Pune and Raigad is 926, 928, 914 and 942, respectively. The sex ratio in Mumbai has seen a marginal improvement compared to 938 in 2017. These figures are based on the CRS which records births and deaths under the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 1969.
A senior public health department official attributed this growth in the sex ratio at birth to the stringent implementation of the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act, 1994 (PCPNDT).
However, activist Varsha Deshpande of the Lek Ladki Abhiyaan noted that the improvement in the sex ratio could have been better if the PCPNDT Act and the 'Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao' campaign was implemented stringently. "The Beti Bachao scheme is implemented by the women and child development department which lacks machinery at the ground level… all this is not helping prevent the elimination of girls in the womb," she explained.
The report pegs the birth recording efficiency in Maharashtra at 89% for 2018, up from 86% in 2017. The state saw 17,33,501 births in 2018, down from 18,01,785 in the previous year.
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