MUMBAI: Long, twirling moustaches and bejewelled daggers are no longer enough for a man seeking to marry in India’s desert state of Rajasthan, long considered a land of fearless warriors. But if he is lucky enough to have a sister, he can relax. A declining sex ratio in the state is prompting a girl’s parents to spurn offers of marriage from men unless the potential groom’s family also has a marriageable daughter for their son, the Sunday Express said. “Around 30 percent of the marriages in the past year in Shekhawati region of Rajasthan were fixed on this swap system,” local lawmaker Rajendra Chauhan said. The sex ratio in many of Rajasthan’s districts has dropped to 922 girls for every 1,000 boys, according to the last census. In one or two villages, it has plummeted to less than 500, the paper reported. The joint engagement pact, called “aata-saata”, or the “double-couple plan”, has emerged as young women find themselves much in demand in a state where the traditional preference, as in much of India, has been for sons. Heavily skewed sex ratios have emerged in several parts of India as couples use ultra-sound technology to achieve their desire for a baby son despite such tests being illegal. A joint study carried out by researchers in India and Canada recently suggested that half-a-million unborn girls may be aborted in India every year.
But now the absence of girls is changing village dynamics, the newspaper said. “There are no girls. If there is one in a house, the father is like a king. He can demand anything,” said Prahland Singh, the head of Bhorki village in Rajasthan. He said that around 30 families had carried out marriages under the swap system in the village of 3,000 people in the last two years. The report said that dowry, where traditionally a bride’s father had to bestow riches on a groom to secure a marriage, has completely disappeared from many parts of the state. Rather the groom’s families are now offering to bear the cost of finding a suitable bride for their sons.