Authorities in India's only Muslim-majority state battling increase in female foeticide, AFP reports

Agence France-Presse examines how officials in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir are battling a "shocking rise in female foeticide" by seizing unlicensed ultrasound machines and enlisting the assistance of religious leaders in the country's only Muslim-majority state. "Provisional 2011 census data released at the end of March painted a bleak picture of India's gender imbalance, with a national child sex ratio of just 914 females to 1,000 males, the lowest figure since independence in 1947," according to the news agency. However, the steepest decline was in Jammu and Kashmir, where "the ratio plunged to 859 girls for every 1,000 boys in the 0-6 age group, down by 82 points from 10 years ago," AFP reports (Tariq, 5/20).