Recently, the Chhattisgarh High Court held that a derailed marriage is not ground to allow the abortion of a pregnancy under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act.
Justice P Sam Koshy, while denying permission to abort pregnancy to a 29-year-old lady, observed that abortion is considered as a crime in India.
In Court’s order, it was stated, “The relationship of the petitioner getting strained with the husband or if the marriage life for some reason gets derailed, are not grounds which are permissible under Section 3 of the Act 1971.”
The Court also noted that the petitioner woman had not got pregnant because of any illegal way or misdoing committed on her or against her consent.
Another thing that was taking into account was that the petitioner was a married lady and she had not claimed that she had become pregnant due to any other person; not her husband.
The coupled had tied the knot in November 2022. However, their relationship didn’t go well thus leading the wife to take legal ways to abort the foetus.
The Court also observed that if the Court were to start entertaining such petitions for the medical termination of pregnancy on such grounds, the core object behind the enactment of the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971 would go unfulfilled.
In the order, the Court also added that abortion can only be done in ‘grave’ situations.
The order stated, “In India, abortion is considered to be a crime. The medical practitioners are restrained from carrying out abortion unless until the situation gravely requires the pregnant lady to undergo abortion. That too is only on the advice of a qualified medical practitioner, who upon medically examining the pregnant lady, reaches to the conclusion that there is an apparent danger to the life or risk to the physical and mental health of the pregnant lady.”
In a situation where the medical termination of pregnancy can be permissible is if there is a substantial risk that the child if born would suffer from serious deformities and health problems.
Based on such observations, the Bench dismissed the plea.
For petitioner, advocate Ritesh Verma appeared for the petitioner. And advocate Pawan Kesharwani appeared for the State.
Source: https://www.barandbench.com/news/litigation/marriage-derailed-strained-relations-abort-pregnancy-chhattisgarh-high-court
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