Editing Infanticide (section)

====South Asia====
{{main|Infanticide in India}}
[[File:Hindoo Woman and Child (March 1852, p.24, IX) - Copy.jpg|thumb|Hindu Woman carrying her child to be drowned in the River [[Ganges]] at Bengal (1852)<ref name="Juvenile1852">{{cite journal|title=Hindoo Woman and Child|journal=The Wesleyan Juvenile Offering: A Miscellany of Missionary Information for Young Persons |date=March 1852|volume=IX|page=24 |url=https://archive.org/download/wesleyanjuvenil08socigoog/wesleyanjuvenil08socigoog.pdf|access-date=24 February 2016}}</ref>]]
[[File:Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant (November 1853, X, p.120).jpg|thumb|Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant (November 1853, X, p. 120)<ref name="Juvenile1853">{{cite journal|title=Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant|journal=The Wesleyan Juvenile Offering: A Miscellany of Missionary Information for Young Persons|date=November 1853|volume=X|page=120 |url=https://archive.org/details/wesleyanjuvenil19socigoog|access-date=29 February 2016}}</ref>]]

[[Female infanticide]] of newborn girls was systematic in feudatory [[Rajput]]s in [[South Asia]] for [[illegitimate]] female children during the Middle Ages. According to [[Firishta]], as soon as the illegitimate female child was born she was held "in one hand, and a knife in the other, that any person who wanted a wife might take her now, otherwise she was immediately put to death".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Westermarck| first = Edward| author-link = Edward Westermarck| title =A Short History of Marriage| publisher =Humanities Press| year =1968| location =New York| page =Vol. III, 162}}</ref> The practice of female infanticide was also common among the Kutch, Kehtri, Nagar, Bengal, Miazed, Kalowries and [[Sindh]] communities.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Panigrahi| first = Lalita |title =British Social Policy and Female Infanticidein India| publisher =Munshiram Manoharlal| year =1972| location = New Delhi| page = 18}}</ref>

It was not uncommon that parents threw a child to the [[Ganges shark|sharks]] in the [[Ganges River]] as a sacrificial offering. The [[Company rule in India|East India Company administration]] were unable to outlaw the custom until the beginning of the 19th century.<ref name="HumSac">{{Cite book| last=Davies|first = Nigel| title =Human Sacrifice |publisher= William Morrow & Co|year = 1981| location= New York|isbn=978-0-333-22384-0}}</ref>{{rp|78}}

According to social activists, female infanticide has remained a problem in India into the 21st century, with both [[NGO]]s and the government conducting awareness campaigns to combat it.<ref>{{Cite news|author=Staff reporter|date=11 July 2011|title=2011 census: average literacy rate improves in Krishnagiri district |newspaper=The Hindu|url=http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-tamilnadu/2011-census-average-literacy-rate-improves-in-krishnagiri-district/article2217649.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130427195220/http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-tamilnadu/2011-census-average-literacy-rate-improves-in-krishnagiri-district/article2217649.ece |archive-date=27 April 2013|url-status=live|location=Chennai, India}}</ref>