Supreme Court Judgement on safe and legal abortion

Sakshi Education

The Supreme Court has declared that all women have the right to safe and legal abortions up to 24 weeks of pregnancy, no matter their marital status. An abortion regulation that made a distinction between married and unmarried women was “artificial and constitutionally unsustainable,” according to a bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, JB Pardiwala, and AS Bopanna.
The bench determined that unmarried and single women with pregnancies between 20 and 24 weeks cannot be denied access to safe and legal abortion.
The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971 had made it illegal for unmarried women who were 20–24 weeks pregnant after having consenting intercourse to have a legal abortion.
In reference to the MTP Act’s pertinent provision, the court’s ruling stated that “it seems to us that to give Rule 3B a restrictive and narrow interpretation would render it perilously close to holding it unconstitutional, because it would deprive unmarried women of the right to access safe and legal abortions between 20 and 24 weeks if they face a change in their material circumstances similar to married women.”

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