Eminent city doctors have been quite lax when it comes to attending the meetings of the board.
Eminent city doctors, who are part of the advisory committee of the Pre-conception Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (prohibition of sex selection) Act, 1994, known as the PCPNDT Act, have been quite lax when it comes to attending the meetings of the board.
This was revealed when DNA conducted a file inspection under section 4 of the Right to Information, (RTI), Act 2005, at the health department of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC).
The revelation comes at a time, when the internationally-renowned medical journal, Lancet, in its recent study indicated that selective abortion of girls "is more common in educated or richer households, presumably because they can afford ultrasound and abortion services more than the uneducated or poorer households.''
According to the study, up to 12 million female foetuses may have been aborted in the country during the last 30 years.
The PMC's advisory committee under the Act, includes eminent doctors, legal experts and representatives of social organisations to help the appropriate authority in implementing the various facets of the Act. As the name suggests, the PCPNDT Act, 1994, seeks to curb illegal sex-determination tests, carried out by ultra-sonography centres.
The advisory committee has seven doctors, one legal expert and the PMC's public relations officer as its members. The PMC's assistant medical officer of health (AMOH) , Dr Vaishali Jadhav is the appropriate authority for the PMC.
The members include gynaeologists Drs Sanjay Gupte, Sanjeev Dangre, Vaijayanti Patwardhan, Nishikant Shrotri and Arvind Sangamner; former president of Indian Medical Association (Pune chapter) Dr Dilip Sarda, and Symbiosis principal director Vidya Yeravdekar. The PMC health department's legal advisor, Milind Salunkhe is the legal expert and Sanjay More, PMC's PRO are the other members of the advisory board.
According to the records maintained by the PMC, Yeravdekar attended just one of the 20 meetings during 2008.
Drs Shrotri and Sangamner attended 17 meetings and Dr Patwardhan was present for 14 of the 20 meetings.
Fifty per cent attendance was registered by Drs Gupte and Dangre while Dr Sarda attended eight meetings. He was nominated as the member of the committee in lieu of his position as the president of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) from 2009-10.
Dr Sharad Agharkhedkar attended the meetings, after he became the president of the IMA.
The worst record was held by Yeravdekar who attended just one of the 20 meetings.
A senior, city-based gynaeologist regretted the poor attendance and said the members who do not attend the meetings should not be a part of the committee. Only those who are committed to the cause should be on the committee, he said.
Dr Patwardhan was affirmative when asked whether the PMC was regularly sending prior intimation of the meetings. "At times, we are sent the intimation verbally, but then we do reschedule our timings to be present for the meetings,'' she said.
Dr Agharkhedkar echoed this view and said, "Some of the doctors do attend the meetings regularly.''
Vidya Yeravdekar and the PRO for Symbiosis Institute, Gopi Bansode, failed to respond when asked for an explanation by DNA.
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