Jaipur, Oct 20 (IANS): The brother of a 38-year-old woman who died under mysterious circumstances has filed a police complaint against her in-laws here, alleging they used to beat her up as she had not given birth to a boy child, police said Thursday.
Rajasthan, among other states, has recently been in the news due to increasing cases of female foeticide and infanticide. Poverty, ignorance about family planning and high dowry demands have been reported among the possible causes for such crimes.
The brother further alleged that the in-laws forced her to abort at least twice when illegal sex determination during pregnancy showed that the child would be a girl.
According to the police, Bhupendra Singh, a resident of Tilak Nagar in New Delhi, registered a first information report with Jhotwara police station Thursday, a day after the death of his sister, Kuldeep Kaur.
Kuldeep had married one Jitendra Singh, living in Prem Nagar of Jhotwara area, in 2005.
"The in-laws told the police that Kuldeep was found dead after they returned from a function Wednesday. She had been left alone at home," said a police officer.
He added that the cause of death was being investigated. "We have conducted the postmortem and the report is awaited," said the officer.
Her brother, Bhupendra, claimed in the complaint that Kuldeep had called him from the bathroom of her in-laws' house two days before her death.
"She was scared and said that she feared her husband would kill her. She had a three- year-old daughter. They wanted a boy and had forced her to abort girl children at least twice in the past," Bhupendra claimed.
According to the Census 2011, Rajasthan has 883 girls between the age of 0-6 for every 1,000 boys.
Alarmed over the state's skewed sex ratio, the state government recently announced steps to curb pre-natal sex determination tests at ultrasound clinics.
The steps include increasing the number of health department inspection teams and equipping them with devices like hidden cameras and voice recorders.
The state government has also increased the amount of money given to a person who complains about errant ultrasound clinics.