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HC issues notice to Delhi govt. on plea to ban sex-selective surgeries on infants

🔺 Syllabus topic:

➖ Sociology : : Gender; Inequality

News in short:

he Delhi High Court issued notice to the Delhi government and Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) on a petition highlighting the need to ban sex-selective surgeries on infants born with “intersex traits”.

A Bench of Chief Justice D.N. Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh gave the direction on a petition by Srishti Madurai Educational Research Foundation seeking to declare a ban on medically unnecessary, sex-selective surgeries on intersex infants and children, except in cases of life- threatening situations.

SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

What is gender, sexual identity and sexual orientation?

  • Gender identity is assigned at birth based on the anatomy (male or female sexual organs, both internal and external).
  • Sexual identity is what one sees oneself as, and Sexual orientation is the sex a person is attracted.

What does intersex mean?

  • Intersex refers to people born with physical and biological characteristics that are more diverse than stereotypical definitions of male or female bodies.
  • The intersex condition arises when it is difficult to classify the reproductive organs as male or female.
  • Genetically, the male is invested with XY chromosomes and the female, XX. In intersex, there are at least 40 different variations.
  • In the field of medical genetics, it is believed that gender assignment is not merely the function of the X and Y chromosomes.
  • Rather, hundreds of genes have been identified, mutations or changes in them lead to a ‘different kind of development’, impacting the gender of the foetus.

What is sex-selective surgeries?

  • In Intersex infants, not all biological differences can be detected at the time of birth.
  • When these differences are apparent at birth, parents are eager to resolve the question of the gender of the baby and pick a gender.
  • They are ignorant of the fact that the child will have to pick a sexual identity in the process of growing up.
  • This could lead to physical trauma, emotional turmoil and problems arising out of confusion about identity.

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