AMN / WEB DESK
Stressing on the need to balance the rights of an unborn child with the right to autonomy of the mother who has sought to abort the healthy foetus on account of her own ill health, Supreme Court on Thursday observed: “We cannot kill the child.”
Faced with a conundrum over whether to allow a married woman, a mother of two, to terminate her 26-week pregnancy, a bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud asked her counsel whether she wanted the apex court to tell the doctors at AIIMS to stop the “fetal heart” of a “living, viable foetus” under a judicial order.
Under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act, the upper limit for the termination of pregnancy is 24 weeks for married women, special categories including survivors of rape, and other vulnerable women such as the differently-abled and minors.
The bench, also comprising Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, was hearing the Centre’s application seeking recall of the top court’s October 9 order permitting the woman to undergo termination of pregnancy at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).
The Supreme Court on Wednesday gave a split verdict on an application by the government against its previous order allowing a married woman to terminate her 26-week pregnancy.
On Friday at 10.30 am, the bench has scheduled the subject for a continuation of the hearing.
The woman, a mother of two, was given permission by the Supreme Court to continue with a medical termination of her pregnancy on October 9 after noting that she was depressed and unable to care for a third child emotionally, financially, or mentally.