Women talked about availability of ultra sound facilities in almost all the areas. Also, almost all the women were aware that sex selective abortion was illegal — and admitted that they would go to different facilities for ascertaining the sex of the foetus and for abortion. Awareness of the new Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques Act was far greater among women and service providers — while awareness of the details of the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act was far less… While most of them admitted that sex selective abortion is indeed illegal, they expressed helplessness as their status in the family and sometimes the very survival of their marriage depended on their ability to produce sons...Although the discussion in most of the studies was in terms of perceptions and the likely actions, Radkar’s study in Maharashtra indicated that 8 out of the 70 abortions or 11 per cent of them were reported as being sex selective. She further reported that “in all the FGDs with men, women, and adolescent boys and girls, it very clearly surfaced that women who go for sex determination follow it up with the abortion of the female foetus. Everyone seemed to know at least some women who had done this”. According to Barua’s study in Gujarat, 10 out of 62 or 16 per cent were performed after sex determination test and confirmation of female foetus.

It was further revealed in a study conducted in Maharashtra by Morankar that when only female children were born or conceived, abortion was approved by the family and condoned by the community...Women from Gujarat and Haryana also reported that while they were not comfortable with abortion per se, when it was done for the sake of the family, then they accepted it.

In the Rural Women Social Education Centre study only in two instances abortion was resorted to to avoid a female birth. In one instance the women underwent abortion because she already had several daughters and feared giving birth to one more daughter. In another instance, the woman reported being beaten by her husband for delivering a third female child, and so aborted the next pregnancy. Anandhi, on the other hand, reported that in her study area, as elsewhere in the country, the preference for a male child and therefore for the sex selective abortion has been quite common.

However, women generally did not seem to avail the new technology for detecting the sex of the foetus. Instead, they seemed to rely on the prevailing myths for sex determination. For instance, if a girl were born with two circle marks on her bottom, the next child would also be a girl. Even though women agreed that the predictive power of such beliefs was questionable, many tended to rely on this for having an abortion...Also, women preferred to undergo sterilization only after a male child was born.

Further, if the male child is still young and the woman conceives again, she would not hesitate aborting the second child, in order to provide special care and attention to the male child.