The recent rape of a 5-year-old-girl in India underscores the seriousness of the phenomenon in that country. The girl had been missing since 2010 in New Delhi, and the police had failed to take adequate action to find her. She was one of the 90,000 children who vanish every year in India.
This recent case comes shortly after two other rapes of young women in India, one of whom ended up murdered by her rapists. It is difficult to equate India's rapid economic and technological development with such barbaric practices.
The problem of systematic abuse of women will only be solved by changing entrenched culture norms that allow the abuse and degradation of women, of which feticide is a clear example.