5 min readMay 14, 2026 04:31 PM IST First published on: May 14, 2026 at 04:29 PM ISTThe Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act, 1971, which was most recently amended in 2021, expanded the permissibility of abortions from 20 weeks up to 24 weeks of gestation. Beyond this limit, petitioners have approached the courts for permission and in many instances medical boards and doctors have opposed the requests. In two notable cases this year, the Supreme Court (SC) has permitted abortion beyond 24 weeks with explicit observations upholding women’s reproductive autonomy. With repeated necessity of court intervention, it is time that legislative guarantees towards the right to reproductive autonomy be expanded for late-term abortions.The most recent case where the SC overturned a Delhi High Court (HC) judgment involved a 15-year-old who conceived through a consensual relationship with a 17-year-old and was not aware of it. On the initiative of the minor’s mother, a medical consultation revealed a pregnancy at 27 weeks. What followed was an ordeal to access abortion after approaching the Delhi HC which eventually denied permission based on the recommendation of a medical board at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). One of the grounds for the medical board’s recommendation was that the minor had no psychiatric disorder. However, the fact that her “psychological and emotional well-being” was so compromised that she was driven to multiple attempts of self-harm was disregarded. The SC rightly paid heed to this important aspect in its ruling. Surely women’s agony need not be scrutinised in such a manner in every case that reaches the courts. It is imperative that the law expands provisions to sensitively acknowledge the psychological burden of an unwanted pregnancy and facilitate access to safe abortions.AdvertisementAlso Read | On abortion, Supreme Court places the woman at the centreThe case led to a curative petition by AIIMS. The SC remained steadfast in its position that women cannot be compelled to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. Their reproductive autonomy cannot be pitted against that of an unborn foetus who gets “too much focus… and not the mother”. Establishing norms for “termination of pregnancy” by “medical or surgical methods”, the law in India recognises the necessity of healthcare supervision. However, it is noteworthy that the SC reminded AIIMS that it should “just… render medical service” and cannot “choose for the citizens” who must be given an opportunity to “take an informed decision”.In late-term abortion cases, a contentious issue that emerges is the mode of termination, which involves preterm birth. This leads to moral concerns around the “viability” of that foetus and apprehensions of possible “foeticide”. The contrarian argument is that the pregnancy be carried to term instead, and the child be relinquished by the mother, and given up for adoption. The SC has held that “that cannot be the correct approach” whereby the pregnant woman is rendered “subordinate to the child yet to be born”. In most such cases of projected “viability”, there is a need for active intervention to resuscitate upon birth. The medical board noted this in the most recent case as well.It is important to question the constitutional grounds on which withholding resuscitation in case of an unwanted pregnancy is equated to “foeticide” by medical boards. Asking a woman who is dealing with an unwanted pregnancy to give birth and give the child away for adoption amounts to compounding her trauma. First, adoption rates in India are very low, with an abysmally low number of children getting adopted out of the lakhs in the state’s institutionalised care. To expect someone to decide to give away their child in this context is extremely unfair. Second, even if adoption can be facilitated smoothly, a woman may not choose to live with the knowledge that she relinquished a child born out of an unwanted pregnancy. It must be recognised that those who request a late-term abortion do so in distress caused by an unwanted pregnancy they could not terminate within the permissible duration for reasons beyond their control. In the two recent cases, the minors were not aware that they were pregnant in the first place.AdvertisementThe MTP Act seeks to recognise “anguish” and “grave injury to the mental health of the pregnant woman” in cases of contraceptive failure and rape. The length of pregnancy is not an obstacle for termination at any stage in case of the detection of fetal abnormalities. Moreover, in view of the SC rulings upholding reproductive autonomy as a fundamental right, it is imperative that legislative guarantees be enshrined to this effect. It is necessary, therefore, to bolster a legislative approach where women’s anguish caused by unwanted pregnancies can be adequate ground to set aside gestational limits.The writer is assistant professor, Department of Political Science, University of Hyderabad. Views are personal