A DOCTOR told his eight-year-old daughter that an alleged genital mutilation procedure that she underwent was just a “check up,” a court has heard.

A jury was on Wednesday played a secret recording of the conversation between the father and his daughter at the first trial for female genital mutilation in NSW.

The recording was from a police bug that was placed in the father’s car just after the girl had told police in an interview that she and her little sister had been cut in their “private parts”.

“Nothing was cut of yours,” the father told the daughter, “we don’t do the cutting, we can’t cut it here.”

“Yes, once they asked for scissors, I saw scissors, they do something with scissors,” the girl replied.

“Not with scissors they do forceps,” her father said. “Forceps is used for cleaning purpose, to check up.”

The girl, now 11, gave evidence at the trial of her mother, 38, who has pleaded not guilty to arranging the genital mutilation of her daughters.

Her co-accused is a retired midwife, 71, who has pleaded not guilty to carrying out the procedures at two homes in Wollongong and Baulkham Hills in Sydney’s north west some time between October 2009 and August 2012.

Sheik Shabbir Mohammedbhai Vaziri, who is a high-ranking religious leader from the Islamic sect Dawoodi Bohra, has pleaded not guilty to being an accessory after the fact to female genital mutilation.

Under cross examination by barrister Stuart Bouveng the girl said the pain during the procedure, “did not last long”.

“It was like a pinching or a cutting I’m not sure,” she said.

But when Crown prosecutor Nanette Williams asked her to clarify what it had felt like the girl said she was most likely cut.

“I’m not completely sure if it was a cut although it was most likely it was cutting, I remember a sort of pinching, I don’t really know though.”

The jury was also played the girl’s interview with police in which she said her mother had told her not to talk about the procedure called ‘Khatna’ which she said was done to all seven-year-old girls in Dawoodi Bohra.

“I’m not used to talking about it because my mum tells me not to go around telling everyone that much,” she said.

The girl’s younger sister, now aged nine, is giving evidence on Thursday.