India's Supreme Court has reprimanded Google, Microsoft and Yahoo for displaying advertisements related to pre-natal sex selection tests on their search engines, in violation of the country's laws.

Prenatal gender testing and sex selective abortion is banned in India due to a skewed child sex ratio, but around 500,000 female foetuses continue to be aborted in the country every year according to UNICEF.

"They are patently violating the law and saying that that they cannot do anything to block such advertisements. It is not acceptable and the government must devise a mechanism to block advertisements," the judges said.

The legal representatives of the companies have said that it is not feasible to block all the keywords present in the ads as it would block all content connected to these words. They also argued that the advertisements on their platforms are not in violation of any laws, especially the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act of 1994, which decrees that sex determination and sex selection are offences and anyone abetting them is liable to be punished.

"You have to abide by the law. You can't say that you are not technically equipped. If you say you are, 'get out of the market," the court said in response. It has also asked the government to file a report on blocking the "illegal advertisements" and to convene a meeting of technical experts and representatives of the companies within 10 days.

In 2015, the Supreme Court had ordered the three companies not to advertise or sponsor ads on pre-natal sex determination services and clinics and to carry its order on their respective webpages on policies and terms of service. However, the companies had argued that the order was a form of "pre-censorship and information blocking".

Meanwhile, India's sex ratio figures remain grim. In 1991, there were 945 girls for every 1,000 boys in the country. By 2011, the number of girls had decreased to 918.

"The matter is in court. We do not comment on any matter that is sub-judice," a Yahoo spokesperson said. Mashable has reached out to Google India and Microsoft India for comment.

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