Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Right to life or Right to choice

In the past few days the question about Right to Life or Right to Choice has come up.
In Mumbai a couple's foetus has been diagnozied with a heart condition and they moved the court to allow aborting the same. The parent's plea was that knowing that the baby if born will face a life of constant struggle they want to spare themselves and the new born the pain. The court rejected the plea on the basis of medical reports which couldnt categorically state whether the child would be born with a defect or not and an archaic law which was drafted over 30 years ago.
If we really talk about Right to life my contention is whether it is the foetus' choice to be born even though when born it might not have a fruitful life. At what point of time does the child get the Right of Choice - when he/she is conceived, when he/she is born, when he/she is 5 years old, when he/she is older...when? If we disregard the moral dilemma and just concentrate on the facts then I find it weird that the decision was based on a law which was drafted 30 years ago. Since that time medical science has advanced so much that the basis on which the regulations were drafted would be defunct. Would it not make sense then to relook at the statutes of the Indian Penal Code instead of debating only the moral grounds of this question?