VOLUNTARY HEALTH ASSOCIATION OF PUNJAB versus UNION OF INDIA & OTHERS

Citation: [2013] 5 S.C.R. 111 · Decided: 04-03-2013 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: K.S. RADHAKRISHNAN · Disposal: Hearing Adjourned

Cited by 5 judgment(s) · see the full citation network in Lexace

Judgment (excerpt)

(2013] 5 S.C.R. 111 
VOLUNTARY HEALTH ASSOCIATION OF PUNJAB 
v. 
UNION OF INDIA & OTHERS 
(Writ Petition (Civil} No. 349 of 2006) 
MARCH 04, 2013 
[K.S. RADHAKRISHNAN AND DIPAK MISRA, JJ.] 
A 
B 
Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques 
(Prohibition on Sex-Selection) Act, 1994 - ss. 7 and 16A -
Discrimination towards female child - Sex Selective Abortion C 
- Misuse of pre-natal diagnostic techniques for elimination 
·of female foetus ..;.. Lack of proper supervision and effective 
implementatien of the Act by various States - Directions 
given for proper and effective implementation of the 
provisions of the Actas well as the various directions issued o 
by the Supreme Court - All the State Governments to file 
status repart within three months ""." Pre-Conception and Pre-
Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition on Sex-Selection) 
Rules, 1996 - rr.3A and 9(8). 
· 
Per K.S. Radhakrishnan. J. : 
Centre for Enquiry into Health· and Allied Themes v. 
Union of India (2001)· 5 sec 577: 2001 (3) SCR 534 and 
Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied Themes v. Union. 
E 
of India (2003) 8 SCC 398: 2003 (3) Suppl. SCR 593 -
F 
referred to. 
Case Law Reference: 
2001 (3) SCR 534 
referred to 
2003 (3) Suppl. SCR 593 referred to 
Per Dipak Misra. J.: 
Para 3 
Para 3 
Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied Themf;s 
G 
111 
H 
112 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[2013) 5 S.C.R. 
A 
(CEHA T) and others v. Union of India and others (2001) 5 
SCC 577: 2001 (3) SCR 534; State of H.P. v. Nikku Ram and 
others (1995) 6 SCC .219: 1995 (3) Suppl. SCR 177; M.C. 
Mehta v. State of Tamil Nadu and others AIR 1997 SC 699: 
1996 (9) Suppl. SCR 726; Ajit Savant Majagvai v. State· of 
B 
Kamataka {1997) 7sec110: 1997 (3)Suppl. SCR 444 and 
Madhu Kishwar v. State of Bihar AIR 1996 SC 1864 - referf'ed 
to. 
c 
D 
E 
Case Law Reference: 
2001 (3) SCR 534 
referred to 
Para 4 
1995 (3) Suppl. SCR 177 
referred to 
Para 6, 18 
1996 (9) Suppl. SCR 726 
referred to 
Para 7 
1997 (3) Suppl. SCR 444 
referred to 
Para 1'4 
1996 (1) Suppl. SCR 442 
referred to 
Para 15 
CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION : Writ Petition (C) No. 
349 of 2006. 
Under Article 32 of the Constitution of India 
Colin Gonsalves, Jubli, Jyoti Mendiratta for the Petitioner. 
H.P. Rawal, ASG, P.N. Misra, Dr. Manish Singhvi, Ajay 
F 
Bansal, Manjit Singh, AAG, S.W.A. Quadri, M. Khairati, Sunita 
Sharma, Asha G. Nair, D.S. Mahra, Gunwant Dara, Seema 
Thukural, Seema Thapliyal, Abhisth Kumar, Archana Singh,. 
Amit Lubhaya, lrshad Ahmad, Devendra Singh, Kuldip Sin_gh, 
Pardaman Singh, Gaurav Yadav, Rajiv Kumar, Tarjit Singh, 
Kamal Mohan Gupta, Gopal Singh, Manish Kumar, Chandan 
G K-umar, $anjay V. Kharde, Abhishek Kumar Pandey, Aman 
Ahluwalia,· Supriya Jain, Sushma Suri, Vartika Sahay Walia (for 
Corporate Law Group), Khwairakpam Notiin Singh, Sapam 
Biswajit Meitei, Arjun Garg, Saurabh Misha, Aruna Mathur, 
Yusuf Khan, AvijitBhattacharjee, Bikas Kargupta, Sarbani Kar, 
H 
VOLUNTARY HEALTH ASSOCIATION OF PUNJAB v. 113 
UNION OF INDIA 
.. 
D. Mahesh Babu, Mayur Shah, Suchitra Hrangkhawl, Amit K. 
A 
Nain, Amjid Maqbool, Anil Shrivastav, Rituraj Biswas, Rachna 
Srlvastav, Utkarsh Sharma, B . .Balaji, R. Rakesh Sharma, P . 
. Krishna Moorthyr:+t Enatoli Serna, Amit Kumar Singh, 
Bhavanishankar V. Gadnis, -8. Sunita· Rao, Hemantika Wahi, 
Sl;lubhada Despande, Nandani Gupta, V.G. Pragasam, S.J. 
B 
Aristotle, Prabu Ramasubramanian, Jatinder Kumar Bhatia, 
Mukesh Verma, A~ Subhashini, Mike·P. Desai, Arun K. Sinha, 
Kamini Jaiswal, P.N. Gupta, Rajesh Srivastava, P.V. Dinesh, 
S~ibhashish Misra, T. Harish Kumar. T.V. George, Balaji . 
Srinivasan, Gaurav Kejriwal, Milind Kumar, P.V. Yogeswaran, c 
B.S. Banthia, Arvind. Kumar Sharma for the Respondents. 
The Orders of the Court were delivered by 
ORDER 
K.S. RAD~AKRISHNAN, J. 
1. Indian society's discrimi-nation towards female child still 
exists due to variou.s reasons which has its roots in the social 
behaviour and prejudices against the female child and, due to 
D 
E 
the evils of the dowry system, still prevailing in the society, in 
spite of its prohibition under the Dowry Prohibition Act. The· 
decline in the female child ratio all over the country leads to an 
iFresistible conclusion that the practice of eliminating .female 
foetus by the use of pre-natal diagnostic techniques is widely 
prevalent in this country. Complaints are many, where at least 
F 
few of the medical professionals do perform Sex Selective 
Abortion having full k

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