Female foeticide toll in state is 55,053 per year

A horrifying number of 55,053 female foetuses are being aborted every year in Maharashtra after sex selection tests.

This was disclosed by the state coordinator for United Nations Population Fund Agency (UNPFA), Anuja Gulati, at a seminar organised by the PM Shah Foundation and Lek Ladki Abhiyaan in the city on Saturday. She also said 1,600 female foetuses were aborted everyday in the country following sex selection tests.

Gulati's presentation focused particularly on the child sex ratio (CSR) as she felt it was necessary to understand the gravity of the declining sex ratio in the state. She said that in the 0-6 age group, there were 913 girls in the state per 1,000 boys in 2001, but the number reduced to 883 per 1,000 boys in 2011.

She said there are 20 districts where the number of girls has plunged to 800 or below for every 1,000 boys. "The data shows that sex selective abortions are on the rise. This is particularly true about the districts which have a good literacy rate and come under rich and affluent population," she said.

Gulati said the situation was no different at the national level. There were 976 girls (0-6 years of age) per 1,000 boys in the country in 1961, while the number came down to 914 in 2011. "If it goes down at the same speed, we will have only 900 girls per 1,000 boys in 2021," she added.

Former state director of health services, Prakash Doke confessed the half-hearted efforts of the government in eliminating sex selective elimination (SSE).

He said that as per the rule, inspection of sonography centres had to be done every three months, which hardly happened.

The meetings of the state supervisory board for implementation of Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Tests (PCPNDT) Act, 1994 were not held regularly.

There are many pending cases under the Act in the courts and many times the decision goes against the government.

"The defenders have a team of lawyers, while only one government pleader is fighting them. How do we expect results?" he asked. He admitted that despite the fact that a law to curb SSE is in place, the result is negative. Social worker Varsha Deshpande and lawyer Uday Varunjikar were also present.

A recent survey of sonography centres by PM Shah Foundation in the city reveals that over 60% of the centres are violating the PCPNDT Act while the Pune Municipal Corporation's list of registered centres was not updated.