Brief Summary: The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill, 2021 is being hailed as a much-needed departure from the existing legal regime under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971 for two reasons: 

1. The bill replaces “any married woman or her husband” with “any woman or her partner” while contemplating termination of pregnancies resulting from contraception failures, thus ostensibly destigmatising pregnancies outside marriage;
2. The time limit within which pregnancies are legally terminable is increased.

About 1971 Act:

• The 1971 Act reeks of moral biases against sexual relationships outside marriage, adopts an ableist approach and carries a strong eugenic emphasis.
• The very Statement of Objects and Reasons of the 1971 Act noted the fact that most of these mothers are married women, and are under no particular necessity to conceal their pregnancy as a logical basis for legalisation of termination of pregnancies.
• In addition to preventing danger to the life or risk to physical or mental health of the woman, eugenic grounds were recognised as a specific category for legally permissible abortions.

Issue in the Bill:

• The limit for the first category (pregnancies terminable subject to the opinion of one medical practitioner) is raised from 12 weeks to 20 weeks, the limit for the second category (pregnancies terminable subject to the opinion of two medical practitioners) is raised to include those exceeding 20 but not exceeding 24 weeks, instead of the present category of cases exceeding 12 but not exceeding 20 weeks.
• The second category is left ambiguous and open to potential executive overreach insofar as it may be further narrowed down by rules made by the executive.
• Further, pregnancies are allowed to be terminated only where continuance of the pregnancy would prejudice the life of the pregnant woman or cause grave injury to her mental or physical health or if the child were born it would suffer from any serious physical or mental abnormality.
• Section 3(2B), however, makes the upper gestational limits inapplicable to abortions necessitated, in the opinion of the Medical Board, by any “substantial foetal abnormalities”.
• The fact that a woman’s right to abortion is exercisable only in the face of such compelling circumstances renders motherhood the norm, and abortion the exception.
• The special classifications of “serious physical or mental abnormalities” and “substantial foetal abnormalities” also reek of societal prejudices against persons with special needs.

Conclusion:

• The bill is at best a tight-fisted grant of fettered autonomy.
• In the landmark judgment in KS Puttaswamy v Union of India, the Supreme Court recognised women’s constitutional right to make reproductive choices and the right to “abstain from procreating” was read into the right to privacy, dignity and bodily autonomy.
• The MTPA Bill, which now awaits the President’s assent to become law, falls short of meeting this constitutional standard and its own stated objectives.

https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/medical-termination-of-pregnancy-bill-passed-7241943/

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