Bengaluru: Police in Bengaluru arrested five more people including two doctors in the prenatal sex determination and female foeticide racket that has rocked the southern state since it was busted last month.
Baiyyappanahalli police on Saturday said it has arrested Dr Thulasiram from Chennai, Dr Chandan Ballal and his wife Meena from Mysore, Rizma a receptionist at a private hospital in Mysore, and Nissar a lab technician on Saturday. The five were part of a major sex determination and female foeticide nexus that had scanned hundreds of pregnant women over the last two years and killed 20-25 fetuses every month.
Those arrested revealed that they were operating for two years in Bengaluru, Mandya, and Mysuru and used to charge between Rs 20,000 and Rs 25,000 per prenatal sex determination and abortion case.
The matter came to the fore last month when Baiyyappanahalli police arrested four people -- Shivananje Gowda, Viresh, Naveen Kumar and Nayan Kumar -- while they were carrying a pregnant woman for sex determination. A police official said they had received inputs about the abortion and sex detection racket. These accused used to take pregnant women whose family members did not want to have a girl child to a house in Mandya where they would be scanned by doctors to determine the gender of the fetus they carried. If the fetus turned out to be female, they would abort it.
Police sources said the racket had been running for the last three years and had scanned over 700 pregnant women during the time. "At least 20-25 fetuses were killed every month. Investigation revealed the involvement of five more people including doctors in the case. The same were nabbed. With this, the number of arrests has increased to nine," the official said.
"The accused used to systematically form a network and commit the crime. In this case, a private hospital in Udayagiri, Mysore and an Ayurvedic Day Care Centre on Rajkumar Road have been seized," the police official said.
D. Devaraj, DCP, East Division Bengaluru said that the four people arrested earlier had made a temporary shed in the sugarcane field near Mandya where they would scan pregnant women whose families wanted them to abort if the fetus was female.
"When the detainees were questioned about this, we got information that some hospitals and doctors were also involved in this. As the investigation continued, it came to know that along with fetal sex detection, abortion of female fetuses was also being done. A doctor and his wife, a broker, receptionist, and technician of a private hospital in Mysore have been arrested in this regard. These accused have been sent to judicial custody. It is known that this act was carried out for three years. About 30-40 cases have been detected and the investigation is on," he said.
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that strict action will be taken against those who are involved in the case. He was speaking after garlanding the statue of Ambedkar in front of Vidhan Soudha on Sunday on the occasion of Constitution Day of India. "We will take strict action against whoever is guilty. A meeting will be held regarding it and appropriate action will be taken," the CM said.
The Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, often known as the Prohibition of Sex Selection Act, was passed by the Parliament in 1994. According to the Act, it is forbidden to employ any method to determine a fetus's gender after conception.
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