Sex-selective abortion and media: review of the film Jayeshbhai Jordaar (2022)

Abstract

Jayeshbhai Jordaar directed by Thakkar (2022) is a worthy intervention around a nebulous but significant concern of female feticide and female infanticide in India. It becomes important as it highlights the nuances of intersectionality within what can be called a global narrative on women’s issues. The exclusivity of sex-selective feticide and infanticide in India makes it evident to introduce separate critical mediations for each narrative. The overturning of the landmark judgment of the 1973 Roe vs Wade case by the US Supreme Court in June 2022 has once again ignited the abortion debate and the question around reproductive rights visa-vis women’s rights globally. According to The Week (2022), 24 countries globally reject abortion even if it involves a risk to a woman’s life or health. Like several women’s issues, even abortion has a customized narrative available. While in most parts of the world, the issue of abortion revolves around reproductive justice and the exercising of a woman’s bodily agency. In the context of India, the situation became complicated with the emergence of sex-selective abortion (or the practice of terminating a pregnancy based upon the predicted sex of the infant). Before 1971, abortion was illegal in India but with the introduction of the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act 1971 and the MTP Amendment Act 2021, women found a newer space to negotiate within the discourse of pregnancy and childbirth. But this space got compromised with the introduction of sex determination of the fetus and selective abortion which compelled the government to introduce the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act 1994, and its amendment in 2003 (where the ultrasound technology was brought into consideration) to reduce coerced abortions and eventually eliminate the chances of arriving at a skewed gender ratio in the future. Jayeshbhai Jordaar exploits the lacuna and impotence of this legal scope in India as sex-selective abortion still happens. Jayeshbhai Jordaar is set in the fictional land of Pravingadh (Gujarat, India) which can be interpreted as a symptomatic reflection of most of the semi-urban Indian cities. The film focuses on the struggles of Jayesh Patel (played by Ranveer Singh) and his wife Mudra Patel (played by Shalini Pandey) against the age-old tradition of son