This paper analyses, from the perspective of women's human rights, an unsuccessful attempt to amend the abortion law in the Penal Code of Sri Lanka in 1995.

The health care scenario for women, especially apropos reproductive health, is highly exploitative, with extensive human rights violations. Women are treated as expendable entities.

The Indian Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act came into force in 1972, in response to the high mortality and morbidity associated with illegal abortion. However, 25 years on, both restrictions in the law and the way it is implemented through service delivery have failed to meet the aborti

Every young girl dreams of becoming a mother after marriage. She looks forward to this period with the utmost hope and joy to see that her child develops well in her womb, has no birth defects and grows up well, so that she can be a proud mother of that child.

Every minute of every day a woman dies as a result of pregnancy or childbirth. The loss per annum of 500,000 women is mind boggling. A maternal death is the outcome of a chain of events and disadvantages throughout a woman's life.

Abortion is one of the leading causes of maternal mortality and contributes significantly to maternal morbidity.

The MCH services are offered at Primary Health Centres (PHCs) and their subcenters in the rural areas, and by general hospitals, women's and children's hospital and MCH centers run by State Health Departments and also through Municipal and Voluntary Organizations in the urban areas.

A growing recognition that population dynamics, quality of life and women's status are closely inter related argues strongly for a fresh look at India's population program.

Literature is replete with images of the reproductive profligacy of the poor in India. In much popular nderstanding, this is frequently adduced as the cause of the poverty of the poor and indeed of the country.

A growing recognition that population dynamics, quality of life and women's status are closely inter related argues strongly for a fresh look at India's population program.