Thanks to the ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ programme, nearly 30,000 girls have been saved in Haryana from being killed in the womb following sex-determination.

Giving details in this regard on Tuesday, Haryana nodal officer of the ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ Programme, Rakesh Gupta, said that while the sex-ratio of the state has increased from 871 girls for every 1,000 boys in the year 2014 to 922 girls in 2020, the state of Haryana has thus protected the lives of 30,000 girl child in these six years, of which 8,000 were saved in 2020.

He said the main objective of the Haryana government is to ensure a visible decline in the incidence of female foeticide, which will result in enhancing the sex-ratio of the state.

Appreciating the “outstanding achievement”, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said in the past of six years the state government took numerous steps to curb the menace of female foeticide, such as large scale awareness programmes, formulating teams to identify centres indulging in illegal sex-determination of foetus and illegal abortions, and registering FIRs against the offenders in addition to giving incentives to those sharing information about violations of the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act and conducting sting operations along with inter-state and intra-state raids.

Khattar said the state government has set a target to achieve a sex ratio of 935+ during 2021 which will be accomplished by continuing the fight against female foeticide.

The nodal officer said this was possible due to regular massive raids being carried out under PC-PNDT/MTP Act against illegal PNDT and MTP Centres operating within and outside the state as well which led to the registration of 100 criminal cases, including around 40 such cases after interstate raids in Delhi, Punjab, UP and Rajasthan. More than 20 FIRs were registered after inter-state raids with a maximum of 11 FIRs filed in Gaziabad in Uttar Pradesh only.

On the district-wise details of the cases registered under the PNDT Act, Gupta said the majority of the districts which had a low sex ratio of below 900 for decades are now better placed at a sex ratio of over 920.

Twenty out of 22 districts of the state are now having 900 or more than 900 as their sex ratio at birth. Elaborating on it further, he said that Sirsa district with 949 as its sex ratio at birth is close to the figure of 950 which, according to experts, is considered as an ideal sex ratio at birth.

Gupta said a total of 5,37,996 births were registered during 2020, which includes 2,79,869 female births and 2,58,127 male births, in the state.