Ultrasound under sex ratio scanner

HYDERABAD: The sex ratio among children in the 0-6 age group in the state plummeted from 976/1000 in 1991 to 961/1000 in 2001. Chances are that the mushrooming genetic and ultrasound centres have an answer to this phenomenon.
True, the evidence is only circumstantial but it''s worth investigating whether there is a link between the sex ratio slide and proliferation of such centres.
Discrimination against the girl child is endemic in districts such as Karimnagar, Kurnool, Nellore and Adilabad. These districts border either Karnataka or Tamil Nadu. Across the border in these two states, there''s an unusually large number of ultrasound scanning centres even in small towns. Intrepid businessmen have even fitted ultrasound equipment to vans and make forays into interior villages.
About five to six years ago, Hyderabad had about 100 such ultrasound centres. Today, there are 384. In roughly the same time, the sex ratio in the city tumbled from 963/1000 in 1991 to 942/1000 in 2001.
"You can''t rule out a correlation between the falling sex ratio and the steep rise in the number of these centres," says Hyderabad collector Arvind Kumar.
With ultrasound vans travelling to interior villages, even poorer sections now have access to sex-determination technology.
"In fact, this seems to give the lie to the claims that the Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) (PNDT) Act has been effective in stopping the girl child''s extermination.
Technically, the act forbids all such centres from disclosing the foetus'' sex to parents. But, people still flout the law," says a gynaecologist, who didn''t want to be named.