Tag: narendramodi

By Saakshi Sharma

The proposed amendments in the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Bill aim to expand women’s access to safe and legal abortion services on therapeutic, eugenic, social and humanitarian grounds.

The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill, 2020 was passed by the Lok Sabha on March 17, 2020. The bill seeks to amend the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971 and increase the upper limit of legal abortions to 24 weeks for special categories of women. 

The bill was passed in the lower house of the Parliament through a voice vote. Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan stated that the proposed bill seeks termination of pregnancy in cases involving victims of incest, rape survivors, minor girls, differently-abled girls or in case of a pregnancy that has substantial foetal abnormalities.

SIGNIFICANCE:

With the passage of time and advancement of medical technology for safe abortion, there is a scope for increasing upper gestational limit for terminating pregnancies especially for vulnerable women and for pregnancies with substantial foetal anomalies detected late in pregnancy.

Further, there is also a need for increasing access of women to legal and safe abortion service in order to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity caused by unsafe abortion and its complications.

Considering the need and demand for increased gestational limit under certain specified conditions and to ensure safety and well-being of women, it is proposed to amend the said Act.

Before 1971, abortion was criminalized under Section 312 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, describing it as intentionally ‘causing miscarriage’.

The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill, 2020, provides for,—

(a) requirement of opinion of one registered medical practitioner for termination of pregnancy up to twenty weeks of gestation;

(b) requirement of opinion of two registered medical practitioners for termination of pregnancy of twenty to twenty-four weeks of gestation;

(c) enhancing the upper gestation limit from twenty to twenty-four weeks for such category of woman as may be prescribed by rules in this behalf;

(d) non applicability of the provisions relating to the length of pregnancy in cases where the termination of pregnancy is necessitated by the diagnosis of any of the substantial foetal abnormalities diagnosed by a Medical Board;

(e) protection of privacy of a woman whose pregnancy has been terminated.

FEATURES:

• The Bill seeks to amend Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act, 1971.
• The Bill proposes the requirement of the opinion of one registered medical practitioner (instead of two or more) for termination of pregnancy up to 20 weeks of gestation (foetal development period from the time of conception until birth).
• It introduces the requirement of the opinion of two registered medical practitioners for termination of pregnancy of 20-24 weeks of gestation.
• It has also enhanced the gestation limit for ‘special categories’ of women which includes survivors of rape, victims of incest and other vulnerable women like differently-abled women and minors.
• It also states that the “name and other particulars of a woman whose pregnancy has been terminated shall not be revealed”, except to a person authorised in any law that is currently in force.

Picture Courtesy: @JagranJosh.com