In the state-owned Maharashtra University of Health Science, the third year students of Bachelor of Ayurveda, Medicine, and Surgery have to learn, among other things, how to “conceive a male child”. The process of creating a male foetus  is called `pusanvan’. According to the text, any woman who desires a boy should be “blessed with the pusanvan ritual” as soon as she gets pregnant, reports Mumbai Mirror.

The text has been taken from Charaka Samhita, the pre-2nd Century CE compilation on Ayurveda, which is a part of the current BAMS syllabus.

b’Source: WikiCommons’

One of the techniques include collecting two north facing branches of a Banyan tree (east facing will also suffice) that has grown in a stable, taking precisely two grains of urad dal  and mustard seeds, grinding all the ingredients with curd and then consuming the mixture.

Another is the creation of two miniature statues of a man out of gold, silver, or iron after throwing the statues in a furnace. Then, the molten element is to be poured into milk, curd or water. And finally, it has to consumed on an auspicious hour of Pushp Nakshatra.

According to a recent Times of India report, Maharashtra’s sex ratio at birth dipped by eight points in 2016 as compared to 2015,according to a report from the state health department. The report said the ratio of newborn girls per 1,000 boys went down from 907 in 2015 to 899 in 2016.

b’A representational image | Source: Reuters’

Last month, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the Maharashtra Assembly recommended a radical move by making pre-natal sex determination mandatory to prevent gender-selective abortions. It proposed that pregnant women should be monitored to check if they have aborted a girl child, in a move to shift the onus on the parents, reports DNA.  

The recommendation angered several social and health activists across the state as they termed a violation of the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, the Medical Termination Of Pregnancy Act and the fundamental rights of women.

(Feature image is representational | Source: PTI)