Indian court cracks down on sex-determination ads

By Shuriah Niazi

NEW DELHI (AA) - The Supreme Court of India on Thursday asked Internet search engines Google, Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing to appoint in-house expert bodies so that advertisements linked to sex-determination tests barred by law could be removed.

A two-judge bench of the Supreme Court said these experts may take necessary suggestions and guidance from the Indian government.

The order came after a public interest litigation filed by petitioner Sabu Mathew George seeking the court’s intervention in light of the declining female sex ratio in the country.

India's apex court last year asked the central government to set up an agency to monitor pre-natal sex-determination advertisements.

Expressing concern over the declining female sex ratio, the court said: “You cannot violate the laws of the country. You must become responsive to Indian law.”

A lawyer for Google India, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, said his clients had already complied with earlier orders passed by the bench and any advertisement which the new government agency deemed unfit would be withdrawn within 36 hours.

There are many Indian states where a decline in the female-sex ratio has been seen in the last two decades. The number of girls per 1,000 boys dropped to 918 in 2011 from 964 in 1971 in the 0-6 age group.

Some areas in India were known for killing girl children before birth. The Indian parliament enacted a law in 1994 to stop female feticides and arrest the declining sex ratio in the country.

The Union government was also asked by the apex court to advertise the new government agency so that citizens could also approach it.