These are external links and will open in a new window. The first Indian woman to initiate proceedings against her ex-husband and his relatives under a law that bans foetal gender determination, has vowed to challenge a court order that absolved the accused of charges that they illegally tested the gender of her foetuses and subsequently pressured her to terminate her pregnancy.
Dr Mitu Khurana says she is still to recover from the "shock" of losing a seven-year court battle against her ex-husband and his family. In , Dr Khurana filed a case against her husband Dr Kamal Khurana, his mother and another member of his family, for allegedly colluding with a hospital official to determine the gender of her foetuses while she was pregnant in , and then pressurising her to undergo an abortion once it was discovered she was carrying girls.
She told the court that she had refused to undergo the abortion, but had been beaten and denied food as a result, after which she slipped into "severe depression. I lost my father. My career is in trouble.
I cannot meet my children. I lost my family. I don't know what she wants," he said. His lawyer PS Singal called the verdict a "well-reasoned" order "based on facts" that showed it was a case of "misuse of the law to settle a score with in-laws". There was an attempt to settle scores with the husband and his family.
The alleged incident happened in Why did it take her so long to register a case, especially when she herself belongs to a family of doctors? How can a doctor not go through her treatment papers? Checks and balances should be there in law so that innocents are not harassed," he told the BBC. The court order said that there were "certain lacunae in circumstantial evidence on which the complainant is relying", that there was no "witness before whom sex gender was disclosed" and no "document on which sex gender of the child was mentioned".
