New Delhi: Sex determination tests, which are banned in India, should be made compulsory to check the killing of female babies, Union Minister Maneka Gandhi has said.
“It is better that we change the policy. As soon as the woman is pregnant, it becomes compulsory for her to tell if it is a boy or a girl and she has to register. If she registers in the initial stages, you will be able to monitor whether the birth took place or not,” said Ms Gandhi, the Women and Child Development Minister on Monday.
“I am just putting out this idea. It is being discussed though there is no conclusion yet,” the minister clarified at the All India Regional Editors Conference.
She called it a different way to look at the problem of female foeticide. “We cannot keep catching people doing (illegal) ultrasound,” she said.
Sex determination tests were banned in India in 1994 in an attempt to check foeticide or the killing of female fetuses in parts of the country where the birth of a boy is considered a boon.
India is among the countries with the worst child sex ratios in the world. The 2011 Census showed that there are 914 girls to 1,000 boys in India.
Reacting to Ms Gandhi’s bold suggestion, some activists have said that allowing sex determination tests may be a disaster in less developed societies where women are given little choice.
(Agencies)
