In the 40 years after the MTP Act came into effect, i.e., from April 1972 to March 31, 2012, 2.23 crore abortions were performed in India. Not only was the same number of children killed, two lakh mothers also lost their lives due to this procedure.
Abortion was, in principle, a criminal offense in India for at least a quarter of a century after independence. It was punishable by up to three years' imprisonment under section 312 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. When Indira Gandhi became the Prime Minister, the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act was enacted in 1971. The Act was based on a 1967 report by the Shantilal Shah Committee which was appointed by the Central Government to assess the need for a pro-abortion law in the country.
Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act 1971
Instead of adopting the comprehensive abortion treatment for women recommended by the Shantilal Shah Committee, the MTP Act offered minor protections for women and several provisions to safeguard the doctor’s performing abortions. As there were no legal grounds for Abortions before the MTP Act, the law was proposed to eradicate the secretive and crude procedures through which abortions were earlier performed. Such procedures had posed a threat to the safety and life of women many a time in the absence of legality. The real intention behind this law was clear from the very name ‘Medical Termination of Pregnancy’. Instead of using the generally accepted term ‘Abortion’, the term ‘Medical Termination of Pregnancy’ was coined. The hidden agenda behind this usage was to protect the doctor’s performing abortion from criminal prosecution rather than the safety of women.
The MTP Act requires one doctor to state that a medically assisted abortion is needed, if the mother is into 12 weeks of pregnancy. The Act also mandates that if the foetus’s growth is between 12 weeks and 20 weeks, two doctors must verify the gestation period and the need for an abortion. According to the Code of Medical Ethics of the Medical Council of India, these doctors must be registered medical practitioners with at least three years of experience in gynaecology and obstetrics. If the doctor is only a gynaecologist, they must have received specialized training in performing an abortion procedure. This training should be under a registered medical practitioner, at an approved hospital, in a minimum of 25 abortion procedures.
The law mandates that an abortion procedure should be recorded in the hospital register within three hours of its execution. This register and consent form duly signed by the pregnant woman are to be maintained in strict confidentiality. Only hospitals approved by Section 4 (1) of the MTP Act are allowed to perform abortions. However, illegal abortion clinics are rampant in India. Many women who underwent abortions in such illegal centres have lost their lives. As mentioned earlier, in the 40 years from the enforcement of the MTP Act till 2012, 2.23 crore abortions were performed, and two lakh mothers have died due to the abortion procedure.
The law stipulates that abortion should be performed only when the pregnant woman's physical or mental health is severely compromised or if the doctor is convinced that the unborn child has serious physical or mental health problems. Whatever the reason maybe, either one of them should be recorded in the hospital records. This section not only legalizes abortion but also authorizes the doctor to decide on the need for an abortion considering the health of the mother or the baby. Some doctors however, out of greediness for money, take advantage of certain loopholes in the law, claims that the mother or baby will face problems and advocate an abortion.
Abortion procedures were even performed on a ‘soon to be born’ baby of eight or nine months under the guise of the MTP Act 1971 when the act only allows legal abortions up to five months gestational period. Even while such atrocities existed in India, ‘The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill, 2020’ was approved by the Narendra Modi Government on January 29th, 2020.
The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill, 2020
The proposed amendment bill altered certain subsections of the existing MTP Act, 1971, and added some new provisions. According to the government, the abortion law was amended considering the health of the mother and the baby.
The main amendment under this act is that abortions can be performed within 24 weeks for those who are sexually abused, divorced while pregnant, with serious physical or mental problems, whose husband has passed away, or are in government rehabilitation centers. According to this amendment, a foetus of upto 24 weeks can be killed without any kind of remorse.
The conditions laid out by the earlier MTP act were further simplified by requiring the opinion of only one approved doctor for termination of pregnancy up to 20 weeks (five months) and two approved doctors for termination of pregnancy from 20 to 24 weeks (six months). With the new amendment, parents, whenever they feel that another child is not required, can opt to abort an unborn child up to 24 weeks! Furthermore, the maximum allowable period does not apply to those unborn who are diagnosed with foetal abnormalities. This is to be examined and confirmed by a medical board consisting of a gynaecologist, paediatrician, radiologist, and statutory members of state governments. Thus, as per the law, a foetus can be destroyed at any time, even just before its natural birth.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) alleges that many of the above amendments were included in the Bill considering findings of studies conducted by the Population Council (India), though they were baseless and unscientific. The IMA also strongly opposes the claim that abortions are performed, not only by MBBS doctors but also by nurses, physicians, and Ayurvedic doctors.
The law also forbids a doctor from disclosing the name of the person undergoing an abortion under any circumstance. Such a violation is punishable either by imprisonment for up to a year or a fine, and even both in some cases. The Central Governments justification for the amendment, that the increase in the period for performing an abortion will ensure dignity, self-sufficiency, confidence, and justice for women is quite bizarre.
Coming up tomorrow... The brutal procedures of Abortion
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