A simple set top box is helping to prevent sex determination and female foeticide.

Taking its cue from Jhajjar, which had the worst sex ratio among the districts of Haryana before staging a remarkable recovery in the past three years, the Jind administration has made it mandatory for all ultrasound labs to install active tracking devices with their machines so as to make available the details of the tests online to the Chief Medical Officer (CMO).

Though Jind is not among the 12 districts identified for concerted action under the Beti Bachao Beti Padhao campaign launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, the district administration has introduced the scheme to track ultrasound machines to curb their misuse for sex determination tests and to improve the sex ratio.

Deputy Commissioner Ajit Balaji Joshi, who had been instrumental in the introduction of the scheme in Jhajjar in 2011, said all the recordings of the ultrasound tests would be sent online to the CMO. This would help the administration monitor how the equipment was being used and what tests were being done.

Mr. Joshi said the plan would cover all the ultrasound machines in Jind. “A set top box is put along with every ultrasound machine, and the power supply to the ultrasound machine is routed through it. So, both would have to be switched on together. The set top box contains a GPRS-based SIM card which sends a message to the CMO and the Deputy Commissioner the moment it is switched on. It records the entire functioning of the ultrasound machine and sends a video in encrypted form to the CMO every day.”

The doctors, who have to pay for the box, also find it beneficial: they can fill up Form F online through this system. The form is mandatory under the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Technique Act. “Filling up this form manually is very tedious,” he said.