Ahmedabad: The Gujarat high court on Monday upheld a sessions court’s decision to deny discharge to a gynaecologist from Mehsana district from the charge under the Indian Penal Code for allegedly carrying out illegal abortion in a sex determination case.In this case, local authority in Visnagar town filed a complaint against Dr Bhagu Chaudhary for sex determination under the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act after a raid on his Sharda Maternity and Surgical Nursing Home. During investigation, it was found that the doctor was allegedly involved in carrying out abortion after sex determination of foetus. This led to registration of an FIR with Visnagar police station in Nov 2012 under IPC Sections 313, 315 and 114. A chargesheet was filed against Chaudhary under PC&PNDT Act and IPC. The doctor unsuccessfully sought discharge from the IPC charges before a Mehsana sessions court. He filed a revision application in the HC for discharge, arguing that Section 28 of the PC&PNDT Act barred registration of an FIR by police and that only a court could take cognisance on a complaint by the competent authority. The state govt opposed the doctor’s application by citing the statements by several women and relatives allegedly showing that sonography was used to determine foetal sex and that pregnancies involving female foetuses were terminated without proper consent or records. After the hearing, Justice Gita Gopi rejected the doctor’s application for discharge from the charge of carrying illegal abortion. The HC said, “During the course of investigation on the complaint by the appropriate authority to take action, some crime under IPC gets detected, the police would have the independent authority to investigate the case and file the chargesheet under IPC. Nothing provided in the PC&PNDT Act would debar the police to investigate the matter under IPC, to file charge-sheet.” The court also clarified, “The magistrate before whom the chargesheet would have been filed would have to commit the case to the sessions court, where the sessions court would only have the jurisdiction to try the accused under Sections 313, 315 read with Section 114 of the IPC and not under the PC&PNDT Act.” It further said, “The court before which the charge-sheet has been filed would have to direct the authority concerned to file a private complaint under PC&PNDT Act for the sections invoked, in case no such private complaint has been filed.”
