Revision summary
Son preference plus ultrasound created a market in missing daughters. PCPNDT exists to stop sex selection disguised as diagnosis. Prosperity did not remove the demand; it sometimes bought the test. Weak implementation leaves the Act unused. Law is necessary and must travel with property and honour reform.
Model answer
Introduction
The PCPNDT Act is necessary because diagnostic technology made son preference a market. Without a ban on sex selection, Seed and Earth kinship plus cheap ultrasound would keep producing missing girls.
Body
The social problem
- Child sex ratio decline in prosperous belts showed that wealth and education did not automatically save daughters.
- Leela Dube’s metaphor explains the demand: the seed line wants sons; the girl is a transferable cost, often via dowry.
- Pre-natal tests turned female foeticide into a clinic service, worse in some ways than older infanticide because it looks medical.
Why implementation, not only a law on paper
- Clinics, doctors, and families collude. Weak inspection makes the Act a signboard.
- Implementation protects the future electorate, labour, and marriage market from a surplus of men and a deficit of women, with trafficking and violence as known risks.
Limits of law
- The Act cannot by itself end patriliny. Succession rights, pensions, and honour codes must move with it.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD SP[Son preference] --> US[Ultrasound market] US --> MG[Missing girls] PCP[PCPNDT enforced] --> BR[Brake on selection]
Conclusion
PCPNDT is necessary as a brake on technological sex selection in a son-preferring society. Implementation is the difference between a statute and a still-falling ratio.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Important components of National Education Policy in India.
Next question in the 2015 paper (Q5). View answer →
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Does the Act ban all ultrasound?
No. It regulates use and disclosure so that sex selection is not the point of the scan.
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Is this anti-choice?
The target is sex selection as discrimination, not all reproductive health care.
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