There are two broad critiques of this law. One, that it sets out to ‘control’ people, provides the state with the mandate to interfere in what is essentially a private matter and imposes a certain morality on individuals. It also makes individuals responsible for a social good like a more equal sex ratio. Two, there is also the argument, first posited by economist Dharma Kumar in her essay, ‘Male Utopias or Nightmares?’ (EPW, 1983), that the law of supply and demand can sort out the problem, so why resort to bans. If the supply of women gets reduced because of sex selection, they will only become more valuable.

To the first argument, one can only say that society has often had to choose between competing rights and social goods — in this case the right/need of an individual to choose the sex of his or her child is pitted against society’s right/need to have more equal sex ratios — while legislating on various issues. Consequently, in the light of certain socially desirable goals, the state would have to favour one right/ good over another. Almost every law or regulation is evolved after making such determinations. To take a facile example, the right of a motorist to arrive at a destination as quickly as possible has to contend with traffic signals which place restrictions on the movement of all commuters for public safety. As for Dharma Kumar’s argument, the ‘market’ for daughters has not got any more bullish despite the millions of missing daughters. Supply-and-demand laws do not work in complex social scenarios. In any case, as Satish Balram Agnihotri has argued, brides and grooms are not undifferentiated products in an unsegmented market. Brides can be imported, as indeed they are, often leading to extremely unhappy and unequal circumstances.

... contd.