(This story originally appeared in on Feb 02, 2016)

JAIPUR: In a complete reversal of the government strategy to fight female feticide, Union women and child development minister Maneka Gandhi said the Centre was considering lifting the two-decade-old ban on sex determination of the fetus and making the process mandatory.

"A proposal is under discussion in the Cabinet to evolve a system that can easily track attempts at female feticide (by parents) instead of punishing the fraternity involved in the medical processes," Maneka said at a conference here on Monday. "Those registering the sex of the fetus will have to produce a medical certificate or cite the reason for termination of pregnancy."



"This will ensure institutional deliveries and virtually abolish the practice of home deliveries in certain areas of the country. Home deliveries pose a threat to a newborn as there might be an attempt on its life," she said.

Maneka said there have been instances of influential people getting sonographies done and pregnancies terminated despite the ban, resulting in action against nurses and doctors involved in the process. "There's no point in increasing the number of people in prisons, which are already overburdened," she said.

On the government’s Khoya Paya scheme , which involves putting up photographs of missing children and those of criminals involved in such cases on a dedicated website, the Union minister said it was yielding results. “This suggestion was made by the Prime Minister and it resulted in 500 children being found within two months (July and August) last year against recovery of 40 children over a span of a few months prior to that (scheme),” she said.The minister also said state governments were lackadaisical in giving land for setting up counselling centres for women facing sexual harassment “The Centre has proposed 660 centres across the country, with each of them having a woman police officer, doctor, nurse, and an advocate,” she said.