The earlier answer correctly identifies the dowry as one of the reasons why female children are often less welcome in many Indian families. I don't know whether the situation is the same among poor families because many of the poorest could not afford a dowry anyway, but among the middle classes the desire for a male child is so strong that the abortion rate for female foetuses is - or at least was a few years ago - much higher than for males, so high in fact that there was fear on the part of the government that the gender balance in the country as a whole would be seriously affected over time. And a woman's failure to produce a male child has caused great brutality and even murder in very cruel ways including burning - a huge irony because gender is apparently determined from the father's side, not the mother's.

It's interesting that in some part of the world it the bride's side who have to provide the dowry, whereas in many African societies it is the opposite: the prospective husband has to pay the bride price. I'm not saying Africa is perfect in this regard because certain beliefs there also lead to children dying unnecessarily, but there is nothing like the negative attitudes towards daughters in India.