While digging a grave for their stillborn baby girl, a family in India has found a newborn baby girl buried, but alive.

Key points: The baby girl was buried in a clay pot and suspected to have been buried for two days

The baby girl was buried in a clay pot and suspected to have been buried for two days Female infanticide in India has been described as "rampant"

Female infanticide in India has been described as "rampant" Sex selective abortion in India was banned in 1994

She'd been wrapped in cloth and placed inside a clay pot, before being buried two feet underground.

The family had been digging near a cemetery in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh when they hit the pot and inside, the tiny baby girl was still breathing.

Doctors said the girl was born prematurely and had probably been buried for two days before being unearthed by the gravediggers.

She weighed just 1.1 kilograms and was being treated for a lung infection at a local hospital.

Hitesh Kumar, the father of the stillborn baby, said he was shocked to hear a baby's cry as the grave for his own baby daughter was being dug.

"At one point, I thought that my daughter had come alive," Mr Kumar said.

"But the voice was actually coming from the pot. When the pot was opened, a baby girl was inside."

A local politician, Rajesh Kumar Mishra, is funding the baby girl's medical care.

This little girl has survived against the odds as her benefactor plays with her. ( Supplied )

"Doctors told me that since she was born prematurely, she needed less oxygen," Mr Mishra said.

"This may be why she's alive. It's a miracle that she survived 48 hours under the ground."

Mr Mishra has given the baby girl the name Seeta, which is connected to a Hindu goddess esteemed for her wifely and feminine virtues.

"She is stable now but she still has an infection and doctors are feeding her milk every two hours," Mr Mishra added.

India's 'rampant' female infanticide

Female infanticide occurs in parts of India due to a preference for sons over daughters, and the nation has one of the most lopsided sex ratios in the world.

The country's last census, in 2011, found there were 911 girls aged under seven for every 1,000 boys.

In the capital, New Delhi, there are 866 girls under seven for every 1,000 boys.

Dr Neelam Singh, a gynaecologist in Uttar Pradesh, said: "Female infanticide and foeticide are rampant.

"This is a national problem, but more cases come from the northern states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.

"In many cases, the culprits are let off due to political and bureaucratic pressures."

The abortion of baby girls became more common in the 1970s when access to ultrasound technology became more widespread.

Sex-selective abortion was banned in 1994, but some clinics still cater to families who don't want to have daughters.

Police are still searching for the parents of the baby girl.

In January this year, a similar case emerged, when a three-week old baby girl was found buried alive in Rajasthan state.

Passers-by heard the baby's screams and pulled her from her shallow grave.