November 28, 2012
The babe is at peace in the womb,
The corpse is at rest within the tomb.
- Percy Shelley, English poet (1792-1822).
The propositions implied in the above lines regarding womb and tomb no longer hold good in the face of advances in technology and medical science. The foetus is no longer allowed to rest in peace in the womb, with ultrasound probes monitoring their progress, and having a peep into their sex. Tombs are raided for the skeletons and for DNA tests, the latest instance being the exhuming, on November 27, 2012, the body of the iconic Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, by French scientists to determine if he was poisoned to death. On the other hand, mother’s love, as Rudyard Kipling noted in poetry, no longer will ensure her presence even if the child were to be hanged on the highest hill. It is a far cry from the idea of mother in the following line of William Makepeace Thackeray, English novelist (1811-1863): “Mother is the name of God in the lips of children”.
The death of Savitha Halappanavar in Ireland on October 28, 2012 has made worldwide media headlines and now the report on the probe into her death, expected to be out pre-Christmas, is awaited. Meanwhile, India cannot take high moral ground on the case, with its own unedifying record on the subject, as reflected in the following two cases.
The first case on abortion was decided by the Bombay High Court in 2008. The court refused permission to abort a 26-week foetus with a claimed serious heart defect after rejecting the mother’s plea to terminate the pregnancy in a case torn between trauma and ethical issues. Dismissing an application filed by Niketa Mehta, the court observed that medical experts did not express any “categorical opinion that if the child is born it would suffer from serious handicaps”. The court noted that considering the defects as they are, experts are not sure whether cardiac surgery will be required at or after birth and added that even if the couple had approached before 20 weeks, it would not have been possible to allow abortion, as the medical opinion was to the contrary.
The court had given the petitioners – Niketa, her husband, Harsh, and their doctor Nikhil Datar – liberty to seek an independent opinion. The court took into account the opinion of three-member panel of doctors of JJ Hospital, which contradicted its earlier finding when it said there were “least chances” that the child would be born with a handicap. The panel earlier had said there were “fair chances” the child would be born handicapped or incapacitated. (Incidentally, the hospital and its doctors did not cover themselves with glory when they put this contradiction to typing error.)
Niketa sought an amendment to the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971 so that the pregnancy can be terminated even after 20 weeks if the doctor believes that the child, if born, will have serious abnormalities, so as to render it handicapped. As per the then 37-year-old Act, a pregnancy can be terminated after 20 weeks only if there was a fatal risk to the mother and not the foetus.
Writing on the subject in The Times of India, Puneet Bedi, a specialist in foetal medicine, said: “Law, ethics, religion and science cross paths in medical practice every day, but no issue is as contentious as abortion. It generates passionate opinions at both extremes. While abortion as a right is debatable, nobody except those with extreme pro-life views argue against aborting an obviously abnormal foetus. Laws have been amended in most countries to allow late abortion since prenatal diagnostic techniques became available. In UK, a grossly abnormal foetus can be aborted at any stage of pregnancy. Even countries where special needs children are provided for by the state, strict laws only lead to illegal abortions and ‘abortion tourism’. In a country like ours, with little social support and no public funding to look after special children, the government’s right to dictate to individual couples by legislation is questionable.”
The second case on the subject surfaced in Lucknow, which reached the High Court at the end of April 2005. A 27-year-old airlines executive, Rajiv Nandi, had filed a writ petition seeking to prevent his wife from having an abortion, claiming it would infringe on his right to fatherhood. His petition before the Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court said that he wanted to “protect his right to fatherhood by preventing his wife, Rekhi, from aborting their baby, due in November.” According to his petition, the couple, married in November 2004, had excellent courtship and happy relations for two months after the marriage. Then things soured and on April 20, the couple came to blows and the matter reached the police station where a compromise was worked out. Apparently, that didn’t hold and Rekhi went back to her parents at Birbhum in West Bengal. With her parents’ intervention (interference?), the situation got even uglier.
It is at this stage that Rekhi told Rajiv that she was expecting a baby, and that she had got the pregnancy confirmed by an ultrasound test. But now, in the hostile circumstances, she would abort the baby. Along with the plea to protect his paternity claim, Rajiv also challenged the validity of the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act 1971, under which termination can be carried out upon the request of the wife alone; the husband’s consent is not required. The conclusion of the case is not tracked and is not relevant in the present context.
An American writer once wrote:
“Men have dirty habits,
They breed like fertile rabbits.”
Perhaps the writer missed the mark. Men sow the wild wind (seeds), leaving the women to incubate and reap the proverbial whirlwind. Men have casual flings and leave the women to carry the burden of pregnancy, childbirth and child rearing. Rajiv’s paternity rights suit should be viewed in this context.
Abortions are sought for many reasons: When the marriage is broken and when the wife is pregnant. When the child is born following rape or incest. When the mother loses mental balance, and is incapable of looking after children, as highlighted in a Bengali couple’s case in Denmark – earlier this year.
So, the current revival of the subject because of the Indian’s death in Ireland provokes renewed debate on the subject. What is your stand?
John B Monteiro, author and journalist, is editor of his website www.welcometoreason.com (Interactive Cerebral Challenger) with provision for instant response.