I was recently going through some summaries of our major epics. Something remarkable struck me. That is most of the offspring, who matter, are male.   

Let us take Ramayana. King Dasharatha had four sons, Rama, Laksmana, Bharata and Shatrugna. Each of them , in turn had two sons. Ravana had seven sons – Indrajit (Meghanath), Atikaya, Akshayakumara, Narantaka, Devantaka, Trishira and Prahasta. Ravana himself had two brothers – Kumbhkarna and Vibhishana. In addition, he had a sister Soorpanakha. Vaali had one son – Angadh. Sita is the central character in the entire epic. We may note that Sita was not from natural childbirth as she was unearthed by King Janaka when he was ploughing.

Let us turn to Mahabharata. Pandu had five sons. Each Pandava had a son (Upapandavas) through Draupadi. In addition, Arjuna had a son Abhimanyu who, in turn had a posthumous son Parikshit. Bhima had a son Ghatotkaja. Dhritarashtra had one hundred sons (Kauravas) and one daughter. Duryodhana had one son Lakshmana Kumar. There appears to be no information regarding children of other Kauravas. Krishna had a son (among others) Pradyumna.

The above statistics defy the theory of Law of Averages by a long mile. Anyway both the epics are mythological stories. But one question has cropped up in my mind. Hindus are traditionally known to have preference for male children. This for maintenance of family lineage. The question is whether the prevailing mindset among Hindus has its roots in our major epics.