The problem stems from a mix-up by hospital staff in Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu. Thursday evening two women, Kamatchi (23) and Farheed Begum (24), gave birth within 20 minutes of each other — one to a boy and the other a girl.

According to hospital records, Kamatchi delivered a girl first and Farheed a boy a little later. But thanks to some carelessness on the part of the ward staff, the babies were switched.

The doctors discovered the botch-up a few hours later. When they broke the news, it resulted in a quarrel. The well-known prejudices against the girl children came to the fore and neither mother would accept the baby girl now.

Faheed abruptly stopped feeding the girl. "Why should we attend to her when she is not our child?" asked Farheed's husband Ansari.

"My wife gave birth to him. He is ours. Just because the hospital made a mistake, it does not mean we can give him away to someone else," said a determined Ansari.

But he also sought to allay any charge of bias against girls, saying, "We would have happily taken the girl home. But not now, when we know the truth.”