Awareness of the Rural and Urban Women about Female Foeticide

Abstract

The present study was conducted in purposely selected Bikaner panchayat samiti of Bikaner district (Rajasthan). For the selection of rural and urban respondents, Bikaner city was divided into four major parts i.e. east, west, north and south zone. Total eight wards and eight villages (two words and two villages from each zone) were selected randomly. A sample of 320 respondents comprising 160 respondents from rural area and 160 respondents from urban area were selected through proportionate allocation random sampling method. Findings revealed that overall majority of the rural respondents (70%) and urban respondents (75.62%) had medium awareness about female foeticide. Further results indicated that caste, mass media exposure and socio economic status had positive and significant association with awareness of rural and urban respondents about female foeticide and number of daughter and number of sons were negatively and significantly associated with awareness of rural and urban respondents. Education was positively and significantly associated with awareness of rural respondents whereas occupation and monthly income were positively and significantly associated with awareness of urban respondents. All the thirteen independent variables were responsible for 75.7 per cent of variation in awareness of rural respondents and 63.9 per cent of variation in awareness of urban respondents about female foeticide.