A family is the most fundamental unit in the human society. The household size and its composition are an important aspect of the family, and the society at large, a balance sex ratio plays a vital part in bringing out, and main training a stable society people in India exhibit a strong gender performance for male child and this discrimination development and higher growth rates. The preference abortion of female fetuses and even to female infanticide. This differential treatment given to the girls and the sex selective 30 to 70 million ‘’missing ‘’ women in India.¹

Female foeticide is the process of finding out the sex of the fetus and undergoing abortion if it is a girl, this is one of the most prevalent issues today, the preference for the most child dates back into history and obtusely, three fore, female foeticides has long been practiced in Indian societies, with the advancement in technology and development of easier and cheaper techniques. Female feticide has spread throughout India.² The government has amended the pre conception and pre-natal diagnostic techniques (PCPNDT) act of 1994 that criminalization prenatal sex screening and female feticide making it illegal in INDIA to determine or disclose the sex of fetus to anyone.³

This is only the tip of the demographic and social problems confronting India in the coming years, keeping this in mind, government of India has tried to stop this crime, introducing the low to preconception and prenatal diagnostic techniques (PCPNDT) act to prevent sex selective abortion in 1994.⁵ As per the census of 2011, the child sex Ratio. India has declined from 927 to 914 females per 1000 males, which is the lowest since the country’s independence.⁶

NEED FOR THE STUDY

Female infanticide or foeticide is an extreme manifestation of violence against women female foeticide is a unique from of violence against women. The Indian penal code under various previsions makes coursing miscarriage an offence.⁴ (Jena, 2018). The word ‘’abortion‘’ has meaning ‘’offensive ‘’ and truly, the practice made to take away the wholeness of a women is an offence which resorted to taking away the life of her own unborn child, Kallor (2019) define infanticide ‘’killing ‘’of an entirely dependent child under ‘’one year of age ‘’ who is killed by mother, parents or others in whose care the child is entrusted.⁷

In Indian society, female foeticide has emerged as a burning social problem during the last few years, the girl child in India as treated right from her birth as an additional burden an extra mouth to feed a liability and another of males in general. In India the situation is just the opposite where the gender ratio or the number of female to makes is known to be among the most imbalanced in the world especially among the people representing higher economic order.⁸

The problem of infanticide could be addressed only through a multi dimensional approach, having effective strategies to address the issues of gender equity, community awareness against the killing of girls, means to address the need of fertility regulation and effective enforcement of the legislation. it is only by a combination of monitoring, education campaigns and effective legal implementation that the deep-seated attitudes and practices against women and girls can be eroded. It is high time we end this barbaric practice, now is the time to energies efforts to put gender equality at the top of international peace and development agenda.⁹

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

A study to assess the effectiveness of self-instructional module (SIM) on knowledge regarding female feticide among primigravida mothers at Rampur Village, Satna, Madhya Pradesh.

OBJECTIVES:

• To assess the pre-existing primigravida knowledge of mothers regarding female foeticide.
• To evaluate effectiveness of self-instructional module on knowledge regarding female foeticide among primigravida mothers.
• To find out association between pre-existing knowledge and selected demographic variables.

HYPOTHESIS:

H₁-There will be a significant difference between pre-test knowledge score and post-test knowledge score regarding female foeticide among primigravida mothers. 

H₂-There will be a significant association between pre-test knowledge score and selected demographic variables.

DELIMITATIONS:

The study is limited to;

• Primi gravida mothers from Rampur Village.
• Mother who are willing to participate in the research study.
• Mother who can understand Hindi or English language.

Research Approach: A Quantitative Research Approach.

Research Design: Quasi-experimental design.

Setting: Rampur Village, Satna.

Population:

Target population: All primigravida mothers. 

Accessible population: Primigravida mothers of Rampur Village, Satna.

Sample size: Sample size for the present study is 40 primigravida mothers.

Sampling technique:  Purposive sampling technique was used to select the samples.

Criteria for selection of samples:

Inclusion criteria:

• Primigravida mothers who are living in Rampur.
• Primigravida mothers who were able to understand Hindi or English languages.

Exclusion criteria:

• Primigravida mothers who were not willing to participate in the study.

Variables:

• Independent variable: Self-instructional module.
• Dependent variable: Knowledge level.

Research tool:

Tool-I: Socio-Demographic data: Demographic data include items to collect background of the mother which include age of mother, religion, education status of the mothers, occupation of mother, monthly income.

Tool -II: Knowledge assessment Questionnaire: It was prepared to assess the knowledge of primigravida mother on female foeticide. Tool consists of 25 items; each correct answer was awarded as one mark. Total maximum score was 25.

Reliability: The reliability of tool was found to be 0.25, which proves the tool to be reliable.

Pilot Study: The pilot study was conducted in Rampur Village with 4 primi mothers who fulfilled the inclusion criteria.

Self-instructional module: The content of SIM was prepared and organized under various headings. The content of the SIM includes; Introduction, Definition of female foeticide, MTP act, Types of pregnancy A/C to MTP act, Condition in MTP act1971, Indication of MTP acts in female foeticide, A legal abortion A/C to MTP act, Legal frame work, Complication of female foeticide and Health education on female foeticide.

Ethical consideration:

• Written permission from concerned authorities.
• Obtained approval from ethical committee.
• Consent of samples was taken for participation.
• Anonymity of sample was maintained.

Data collection procedure:

The formal permission was taken from the authorities of the Rampur Village, Satna. The investigator obtained the consent from the participants by explaining the purpose of the study. The investigator collected data for 1 month. After the pre-test, the self-instructional module was distributed. The duration of teaching program was 45 minutes. After 21days gap, post test was conducted to the same mothers to evaluate the effectiveness of the SIM.

Table-1: Frequency and percentage distribution of knowledge among primigravida mothers.                                                                                                                                                       (N=40)

Fig-1: Frequency and percentage distribution of knowledge among primigravida mothers.

Table no-2: Comparison of means of Pre-test and post-test knowledge score of primigravida mothers.                                                                                                                                      (N=40) 

MAJOR FINDINGS OF THE STUDY:

I:  Description of demographic variables:

Among 40 samples, 40% were belongs to the age group of (30-39) years, 45% had no formal education, 60% of the mothers were housewives, 33.3% belongs to joint family. 65 % of families had monthly income less than Rs 5000, 55 % were Hindus and 85% of them had no previous knowledge about the topic.

II: Frequency and percentage distribution of level of knowledge among primigravida mothers:

Among 40 samples, in pre test, none of them had excellent knowledge, 85 % had average knowledge and 15 % had good knowledge. In post test, 70% had excellent knowledge, 30 % had average knowledge and none of them had average knowledge regarding female foeticide.

III: Effectiveness of the SIM on knowledge regarding female foeticide:

The pre test mean knowledge score was 25.67 with standard deviation of 4.68. And the post test mean knowledge score was 32.15 with standard deviation of 3.21. So, there is a significant improvement in knowledge score after the administration of planned teaching program.

IV: Association between level of knowledge and demographic variables:

There was statistically significant association of knowledge score with age, education, occupation of primigravida mother, family monthly income and exposure to previous teaching on female foeticide. But there was no statistically significant association of knowledge score with type of family and religion of mother.

The study is concluded that, most of the primigravida mothers had developed knowledge after the administration of planned teaching program. Hence, it can be concluded that the awareness program was found effective to increase in the knowledge level of mothers on female foeticide.

1. Khishoor, Sunita, et al. "India's Population and Development Review." India Population and Development Review, vol. 28, no. 4, 2011, pp. 759-785.
2. Kim, Amladfred Miniju, Cho, K., and Kroy, T. "Son Preference, the Family Building Process, and Child Mortality in India." Population Studies, vol. S2, 2018, pp. 301-315. https://doi.org/10.1080/00324728.2018.1501702.
3. The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971.
4. The Indian Penal Code, 1860.
5. The Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act, 1994; The Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selecting) Act, 1994.
6. Nelson, R. A. Indian Penal Code, 10th ed., vol. 3, Butterworth Publication, Nagpur.
7. Patel, Tulsi, editor. Sex Selective Abortion in India. Sage Publications Pvt. Ltd., 2017.
8. Reddy, G. B. Women and the Law, 5th ed., Gogia Law Agency, 2012.
9. Beliappa, J., and Ramu, S. "Declining Sex Ratio and the Problem of Female Infanticide: A Study in Salem District of Tamil Nadu." Department of Women and Child Development, Government of India, 1994.