FEMALE FOETICIDE IN INDIA: A BRIEF NOTE

Tashbya Shamsi

Female foeticide is the procedure of determining the gender of a foetus and aborting it if it is a girl. Despite the fact that it is illegal, this inhuman practice is still very much rampant.

Certain societies practice female infanticide, which is the death of a girl child after she is born. Census 2001 statistics suggest that there are only 933 women for every 1000 men in the country, highlighting this reality.

This unnatural and highly unethical practice must be ended because all genders have an equal right to life. To accomplish so, it is vital to safeguard their rights by forbidding dowry, female unemployment, underage marriage and caste discrimination among among other issues.

Female Foeticide Causes:

There may be plenty of causes behind female foeticide. Some are mentioned below:

a. Sexual Harassment b. rape c. Lack of Education d. Dowry System e. Medical industry corruption etc.

Control Measures:

• The Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Female Foeticide), 1994 (came into effect in the year 1996).

The above legislative intervention deals with various aspects of female foeticide including establishing accountability and other essential procedural and punitive measures.

Section 3A of the Act deal with “Prohibition of Sex Selection”:

Prohibition of sex-selection- No person, including a specialist or a team of specialists in the field of infertility, shall conduct or cause to be conducted or aid in conducting by himself or by any other person, sex selection on a woman or a man or on both or on any tissue, embryo, conceptus, fluid or gametes derived from either or both of them.

Like any other legislation that essentially are social interventionist in nature above legislation faced serious challenges on many fronts including social practices and technological advancements. The Government became aware of some shortcomings and practical challenges in its administration.

Newer techniques have been developed to choose sex determination even before conception, resulting in a child with a specific sex. The sex ratio is continuing to fall. The Supreme Court took notice of these changes as well.

Important cases related to foeticide are:

• Federation Of Obstetrics And vs. Union Of India on 3 May, 2019
• Voluntary Health Ass. Of Punjab vs. Union Of India & Ors on 8 November, 2016
• Sabu Mathew George vs. Union Of India And Ors. on 13 December, 2017

The Public Health Advocate while observing the issue in greater detail observed that, “India should work to allocate more resources to better enforce the Prohibition of Sex Selection Act. Although the government launched a similar campaign in 2015, it was unsuccessful. To improve their efforts, experts recommend that the government should charge doctors who conduct illegal sex determination testing with hefty fines and strengthen detection for illegal clinics and services provided by gangs.“