(Updates with health minister)

By Kamil Zaheer

NEW DELHI, July 13 (Reuters) - India plans to create a registry of all pregnancies to help curb widespread female foeticide and reduce its infant mortality rate, officials said, although activists say the scheme will be hard to implement.

At the same time it aims to promote safe deliveries at health centres and hospitals, Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss said, with the help of thousands of state-funded Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) in rural areas.

"One of the work of ASHAs will be to register pregnancies and identify a pregnant lady and take her for two-to-three antenatal check ups and for delivery," Ramadoss told reporters.

Despite India's robust economic growth over the past few years, more than half of women deliver children at home.

And with many people strongly preferring boys, around 10 million girls have been killed by their parents in the past 20 years, the government says.

The plan to record the number of pregnant women would help in saving thousands of unborn and newly born girls, officials said.

"With this, mysterious abortions will become difficult," Women and Child Development Minister Renuka Chowdhury told the Hindustan Times.

The government wants to ensure abortions -- often carried out illegally with the aim of doing away with female foetuses -- were done for an "acceptable and valid reason", she said.

Despite a law banning sex determination tests, many parents get female foetuses aborted, taking advantage of the widespread availability of ultrasound technology and the willingness of some doctors to conduct illegal abortions for money.

Others kill newly born girls by breaking their necks or, in some rural areas, by stuffing hay down their throats.

Earlier this month, a two-day-old baby girl was found alive in a grave in southern India after being buried by her grandfather who wanted to avoid the cost of bringing her up.

WRONG FOCUS? GOOD MOVE?

Some activists said the plan to create a pregnancy register in a country of 1.1 billion people was unrealistic.

"We cannot give elementary health services in a satisfactory way to most of our citizens, and to talk about registering pregnancies is ridiculous," said Alok Mukhopadhyay, head of the Voluntary Health Association of India.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) welcomed the plan but said the government needed to provide more facilities for institutional deliveries in rural areas and crack down harder on doctors abetting foeticide.

"Registering pregnancies is good," said Marzio Babille, UNICEF's head of health in India.

"If we act upon mothers by registering pregnancies, offering quality antenatal care, good counselling to deal with complications and an efficient transportation network ... this would enormously help promote institutional deliveries and strengthen and expand the safe maternity scheme," Babille added.

At present, India's infant mortality rate is 57 per 1,000 live births, which is higher than impoverished Bangladesh and Namibia and double that of Egypt.

The government also wants all rural health centres, hospitals and maternity homes to register pregnancies.

Many Indian parents prefer a boy as he is seen as a future breadwinner who will take care of them in their old age. A girl is perceived to be a burden for whom a large dowry will have to be paid at the time of marriage.

AlertNet news is provided by