Gang using portable ultrasound scanners, UPS for sex tests in car

Ghaziabad: A 42-year-old woman arrested on Tuesday in connection with illegal sex determination tests was part of a gang that was using portable mobile phone-sized ultrasound scanners connected with UPS for power inside cars on a desolate spot on the Eastern Peripheral Expressway.
While illegal foetal sex determination rackets, operating out of clinics and nursing homes — several of them operating from congested Loni border areas — have been busted earlier, health department officials said this was the first time they came across a gang running their operation from moving vehicles and changing their location frequently to avoid detection.
Umesh Gupta, legal health officer, said one of the gang’s mediators, Meenakshi Tyagi, was arrested during a decoy operation of Haryana and Ghaziabad health teams. Her role was to bring in pregnant women from nearby NCR districts for the prenatal sex determination tests.
“Earlier, the department has busted pre-natal sex determination rackets operating out of unregistered ultrasound centres. This is the first time we have noticed a change in the pattern. We have come to know the tests were being done with the help of a mobile-sized portable ultrasound device connected to an external battery or UPS for power in the vehicle,” Gupta said.
In the last three years, 18 clinics were shut down for performing sex-determination tests. While seven cases were registered in 2023, three were lodged till July this year.
The official said at least three more cars were used by the gang. “They are operating in clusters. While the tests are done in one of the cars, three to four others would move on the EPE to alert the group of police movement,” Gupta said. He added the gang typically took up to Rs 35,000 for the tests.
On Monday, a pregnant woman from Alipur in Delhi was used as a decoy and sent to Tyagi for a pre-natal sex determination test. The decoy met Tyagi in Sanjay Nagar and was then taken to EPE in a car.
“Near Matiala village, the decoy and Tyagi got off and crossed over to the other side of the EPE to a parked Santro, where the woman was asked to lie down on the seat for the test. Once out of the car, the decoy was told to pay Tyagi Rs 16,000. As the woman signalled the health officials, a team rushed to the car and nabbed Tyagi. The doctor, however, escaped towards the village in the car,” deputy CMO Anurag Sanyog said.
An FIR has been registered at Masuri police station under the provision of the Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act and under Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita sections 318(4) (cheating) and 61(2) (criminal conspiracy). A team has been now set up to nab the doctor, AM Gaur, who would take Rs 11,000 for each test.