Governments lack concern for female child: SC

"The government has become sloppy. Central and State governments are supposed to organise camps. They don’t. Then what awareness can you spread?"

Pulling up the Union and State governments for the “sloppy” implementation of the pre-natal sex determination law despite its existence for the past 20 years, a Supreme Court Bench of Justices Dipak Misra and N.V. Ramana on Tuesday said the approach reflects “lack of concern for the female child.”

The observations came on an application filed on August 2013 by Sabu Mathew George, a member of the National Inspection and Monitoring Committee (NIMC) set up under the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act of 1994, alleging that pre-natal sex determination continues to be done by doctors, hand-in-glove with conniving authorities. Dr. George charged that female foeticide continued unchallenged despite a March 2013 judgment by the Supreme Court. The court had at the time observed that eliminating female foetuses after pre-natal diagnostic tests had pushed the female child ratio down nationwide.

“The government has become sloppy. Central and State governments are supposed to organise camps. They don’t. Then what awareness can you spread?” Justice Misra asked Additional Solicitor-General Neeraj Kishan Kaul, representing the Union government.