Kerala: Doctor arrested for performing illegal abortion of minor girl

Kollam: A 68-year-old doctor cum owner of a private hospital in Krishnapuram has been arrested by Kilikollur police on Tuesday for allegedly conducting illegal abortion on a minor girl.

According to the police, the doctor is facing allegations of conducting the procedure without proper documentation and misrepresenting the girl's age in the records to cover up the crime.

The incident came to light after a team led by Kollam Assistant Commissioner of Police M. Sheriff with members including Kilikollur sub-inspectors S. Sreejith, C. Santhosh Kumar, and S. Lalu; and Civil Police Officers Saj, Bijeesh and Anitha Kumari as per the instructions of District Police Chief (Kollam City) Chaitra Teresa John raided the hospital.

Also read- Bengaluru doctor booked for performing 74 illegal abortions in 3 years

As per The Hindu news report, the police discovered that the doctor illegally aborted the pregnancy of the minor girl by not keeping proper records and destroying evidence by adding false age in the records.

Following the preliminary investigation, the police arrested the accused after registering a case under relevant sections of IPC. While going through the history records of the accused doctor, the police found that he was involved in similar cases at the Kayamkulam and Shaktikulangara police stations.

It came to light that after releasing on bail from Shaktikulangara police station, the accused was told not to get involved in cases of similar nature. However, he was recently taken into custody.

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that three doctors along with 16 other suspects were named in the final report filed by the Central Investigation Department (CID) in an illegal sex determination-cum-foeticide racket case. The agency forwarded the report to the health department as it lacks the authority to file a charge sheet in the matter.

The 19 suspects included three doctors, two lab technicians, two nurses, one scanning machine vendor and eleven touts. While 18 suspects were arrested and released on bail, one suspect was at large.

Also read- Karnataka Sex Determination Racket: CID names 3 doctors among 19 suspects in final report