Plea to terminate rape’s victim pregnancy rejected by Bombay High Court

In a recent ruling, the Bombay High Court rejected the plea of a 26- week pregnant rape victim asking for the termination of pregnancy.

In the instant matter, petitioner, father of the rape victim, claims that his daughter did not return from school on June 26. His daughter was kidnapped by a boy living in the neighborhood and was taken to an unknown location and was raped. He instantly filed a complaint before Pune Police. Due to the improper and inadequate investigation carried out by the police, it took them eight months to find his daughter. By this time, the boy who kidnapped her had already forcefully married the girl. The girl was only 17 years old when she was kidnapped and raped.

The petitioner claimed before the High Court that the girl was mentally and physically not capable of giving birth to a child. Furthermore, delivering a baby at such a tender age will impact her health adversely.

However, the court refused to grant relief to the petitioner and rejected the plea for termination of pregnancy. The division bench of Justice Ranjit More and Justice Sarang Kotwal held that termination of pregnancy cannot be allowed in this case as the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act does not permit termination if fetus the is older than 20- weeks. In this case, the girl has been pregnant for over 26-weeks and hence the permission cannot be granted.

To protect the interest of the victim the court also directed that if the girl wishes to claim compensation, then she can file a separate petition in this regard.