Pregnant woman beaten to death in Rajasthan

Family members of a pregnant woman in Rajasthan have alleged that she was beaten to death by her in-laws when they came to know through a sex determination test that she would give birth to a girl child, police said Monday.

Shivari Devi's brother Ramdeen registered a first information report (FIR) in this regard in Jodhpur's Bhopalgarh police station Sunday night. 

"The incident occurred in a nearby village where Shivari Devi stayed with her in-laws. The brother says that her in-laws informed him yesterday (Sunday) that she had died," said police inspector Moolaram Choudhary.

The officer said that as per the complaint, Shivari Devi, who was in her 20s, called up her brother a couple of days ago informing him that the in-laws had got a sex determination test carried out on her and were harassing her since they came to know that she was carrying a girl child.

"He says that the in-laws wanted a boy child. He also says that there were injury marks on his sister's body and she died after she was beaten up by her in-laws," said the officer.Choudhary added the woman's husband Sahiram is a pharmacist in a government hospital in Jodhpur. "We have launched an investigation into the allegations," said the officer.

Some areas are infamous in the state for female foeticide and infanticide cases. According to Census 2011, Rajasthan now has 883 girls between the ages of 0-6 for every 1,000 boys. The child sex ratio in 2001 was 909.