This guest post is courtesy of Greta Griswold, Regent Law 3L:
We have each likely seen some form of embarrassing or incredibly touching gender reveal. While those parties and reveals and abound in the United States, you will not find them in India.
In 1994, India passed the Pre–Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PNDT) Act which regulated the use of prenatal diagnostic techniques to curb female feticide. Particularly the act sought to regulate ultrasound machines which often facilitated sex-selective abortions. Physicians were permitted to use ultrasounds in detecting genetic abnormalities, but not for sex determination.
Despite these regulations, the male-to-female ratio in children ages zero to six continued to declined. Further, ultrasound regulations led to unintended consequences in other medical disciplines. To use ultrasound machines and technology, doctors and hospital had to complete onerous paperwork and registration leading to a decline in ultrasound usage in the broader medical context.1
Scholars have criticized the PNDT for “oversimplify[ying] a complex problem by placing the moral and legal onus on physicians instead of on patients committing female feticide and the families supporting them.” This problem like many others is fundamentally a problem of the heart. A failure to see women as equals, as created in the image of God.
Systemic change and regulation must also be met with theological change. Both are necessary. As Christians, we need not cast off legal or systematic change though the main problem lies within the heart. However, our hope is also not in legal systems, but in Christ.
Christians ought to proclaim biblical truths while supporting earthly measures that lead to such flourishing.
In 2015, the government launched a campaign “Save the girl child, educate the girl child.”2 I can guarantee this sounds better in Hindi because girl child is one word. It’s more like, “Save the girl, educate the girl.” Advertisements were everywhere. The government increased the penalties for illegal use of ultrasound machines for sex screenings. The government did good. The government promoted human flourishing despite not being motivated by Christian principles. Imagine how much more society could change when legal and cultural change are bolstered by the Christian witness the when God created humanity, he created them in his likeness, male and female he created them.
1. Sheida Tabaie, Stopping Female Feticide in India: The Failure and Unintended Consequence of Ultrasound Restriction, J. GLOBAL HEALTH (March. 30, 2017), https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5441446/.
2. Yunping Tong, India’s Sex Ratio at Birth Begins to Normalize, PEW RESEARCH CENTER (Aug. 23, 2022), https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2022/08/23/changes-in-son-preference-ultrasound-use-and-fertility/.
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