Jharkhand: Administration lens on USG clinics in Palamu as gender gap widens

DALTONGANJ: The Palamu administration has sounded an alert over the skewed gender ratio in the district and asked officials to check if ultrasound clinics are carrying out illegal sex determination tests.
The alert was sounded after an official document found an increasing gap in the gender ratio in the district. The document, accessed by TOI here, revealed that for 1,000 males, there are 926 females in Palamu.
According to the 2011- 21 census, the population of Palamu is 19,39,269 of which the number of females is only 9,33,567.
Additional chief secretary Arun Kumar Singh who is at present looking after the state health, medical education and family planning department, sent a letter to the Palamu deputy commissioner to hold a meeting of the district advisory committee on the pre-conception and pre-natal diagnostic centres here.
Deputy commissioner Shashi Ranjan told this correspondent on Wednesday that he held a meeting of the advisory committee very recently and asked officials to find out if any of the ultrasound clinics here was indulging in any malpractice in respect of sex determination.
There are 27 licensed ultrasound clinics in this district, Ranjan said.
He refused to comment when asked if he was aware of any ultrasound clinic carrying out sex determination tests surreptitiously.
The deputy commissioner said, “We have asked officials to keep tab on the number of abortions and possible female foeticide."