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Sunday, Jul 22, 2007
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Probe into foeticide

Staff Reporter

Schoolchildren find 7 foetuses

Raids on nursing homes revealing sex of the child
Team finds foeticide is regular in the area

BHUBANESWAR: The Orissa Government on Saturday ordered a crime branch inquiry into the alleged killing of seven female foetuses in a village in Nayagarh district, about 100 km from here.

The State Government’s decision came in the wake of concerns raised by local residents and human rights activists on the issue. Schoolchildren had stumbled upon seven dead female foetuses in blood stained polythene bags at Ramachandi Prasad village of Nayagarh on July 14. The incident immediately caught public attention.

Subsequently, local police had conducted several raids on nursing homes that were having ultrasound instruments that helped detect the sex of foetus.

Sources said the police had found many illegal operations in different nursing homes in Nayagarh town.

The foetuses, which were said to be between five and eight months, were dumped near a place where waste materials were stacked, said Anuradha Mohanty, of Jana Adhikar Abhijaan, here.

Ms Mohanty was part of an eight-member fact-finding team constituted by Orissa Alliance on Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) that visited the place after the incident came to light.

The team found that foeticide was a regular phenomenon in the area. It expressed concern that despite statements recorded by the team that the foetuses were lying at the spot when the police reached, no effort was made for medical examination of the foetuses. "Even the FIR states that the foetuses were not at the spot when they went to investigate."

The team demanded that the State Supervisory Board constituted under Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Amendment Act 2002 need to function properly and proper enforcement of Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971, Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Amendment Act 2002.

Similarly, the nursing homes and ultrasound clinics without licence or registration must be closed, it said. In Nayagarh, the sex ratio as per 2001 census was 939 which was third lowest in the state and further declining trend was observed in child sex ratio, the team said. It added in the age group of 0 and 6 years, the sex ratio was 901 in the district, the lowest in the State.

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