A new-born baby boy who was kidnapped on November 4 from the National Institute of Child Health (NICH) was recovered ten days later. The nurse who stole the baby and the couple who paid her Rs 30,000 for the child were arrested, thus ending the drama of the most painfully distressing crime. The distress was felt not only by the baby's parents but by all who heard.
"It could have been my baby," is a thought that must have run through the head of so many parents because this is a fear that haunts them ever since it became the norm to have babies born in hospitals and maternity homes. Even the elderly are haunted. "It could have been my grandson," they must have thought. The fear is not only that a child could be kidnapped. Another fear is that a child may be exchanged and parents go home with the wrong baby. Another persistent fear is that a nurse may accidentally drop the child and cause physical or mental damage to the baby.
In the maternity wards a common sight is granny type of women sitting or walking about outside the labour room. As soon as a child is delivered, they want to look at it. They want to identify the child as theirs. Hence there is often a lot of tension, barely suppressed, in the patient's attendants waiting outside a labour room. They may have a tasbih and silently recite Quranic verses or they will chat with the attendants of other women in labour. But few will take a siparah and read it. This is because the tension inhibits concentration.
Kidnapping of new-born babies was not a crime previously, when babies were born at home. Occasionally there were reports but they sounded like myths. Of course kidnapping babies from hospitals is not a common crime either, but it definitely exists and nearly every year one hears of new-born babies stolen from hospitals in all the cities, not just Karachi. A point to ponder is that the kidnapped baby is always a boy.
The cultural importance of a male child has not diminished even in a sophisticated city like Karachi. There is always openly expressed joy at the birth of a male child, while at the birth of a girl child there is a forced expression of joy, the congratulations of friends and family sound decidedly hollow.
The downside of this attitude is that it has led to unnecessary abortions of female foetus whose rate has gone up alarmingly. Childless parents become desperate and want to have a male child, literally by hook or by crook. It is hospital policy not to reveal the sex of the foetus, but often even the persons manning the ultrasound machines spontaneously tell an expectant mother if the child is a boy. The technician is simply responding to social norms, that a male child is good news.
The argument for the desirability of a male child is that they will be the support of aged parents. Couples keep contributing to the population boom when they produce girl after girl after girl. Sometimes the tally will be five or six girls before the prince charming finally appears in their lives. In the meanwhile the family is dragged down to the very depth of poverty with so many mouths to feed. By the time the boy grows up they will be dead or ailing. The dutiful son will feel that he is not their support but that they are his burden.
The Edhi Apna Ghar home for elderly is full of abandoned parents. The preacher may talk about honouring parents and quote from the Holy Quran that the parents looked after you when you were young and you must look after them when they are old. But in middle income families it is now the general opinion that aged parents are simply a burden and money that has to be spent on their health care is money that ought to be spent on their own children. In short they have to deprive their young ones to support their old parents. The male-child economic theory is therefore decidedly a flop.
Among the poor and culturally backward there is really no compassion, let alone love of the male child. His childhood is stolen as at the tender age of five and six years he is sent off to work. In brick kilns tiny little kiddies work through the day along side their parents.
One of the worst practices is the dedication of sons to some saint. The child is left at the shrine where he is brought up by the shrines caretakers. The cases of child abuse at shrines is also a common crime against children. How can parents allow their bonny, healthy baby to be turned into a Shah Dulla's rat. The child's skull is put into a tight iron cap so that his brain cannot grow normally. These mutilated children are often seen in Karachi, taken about the streets to beg.
Pakistan may be the first Muslim country to have had a female prime minister, but that has not changed our social outlook. In the parliament, bills for women's rights are persistently ignored or refuted. It is a proof that we continue to be a male dominated and male chauvinist society.
Of course, the social orders of the world have given preference to male child and often at the expense of the female child. Advanced societies, however, realised that too many economic woes begin with the desire for male offspring. But even they have had to make a conscious effort to educate their society that the female is as economically viable as the male. A change in attitude is necessary if we are to bring down the rate of population growth, if we are to end poverty, if we are to send children to school instead to the factory or garage to work. Think about it if you are truly interested in a better future for tomorrow's citizens.