A 15-year-old teenager in India will not abort her unborn baby after enduring months of sexual abuse allegedly at the hands of her cousins.
NDTV reports the victim, who is not named in reports, is from Haryana, India. Her mother recently took her to the doctor after the teen began complaining of stomach pain, and the examination revealed that she was eight months pregnant.
She will not abort her unborn baby. Her pregnancy already is past the 20-week abortion ban in India. At eight months, her unborn baby already is fully developed and likely to survive outside the womb.
The teen said her pregnancy is the result of being raped repeatedly by her cousins. She said they also threatened to kill her parents if she told anyone about the abuse.
Here’s more from the report:
The residents of Sonipat’s Mahipur village, her chacha’s (uncle) sons, one a minor and the other an 18-year-old, not just allegedly raped her, but also threatened her that they would kill her parents if she reported the matter to anybody.
She told her mother that her cousins first raped her in December last year. She was alone at home and had gone to dry clothes on the terrace when the duo, Suraj and Ajeet, allegedly raped her. Since then, the girl alleges, she has been raped multiple times by them.
Police said they arrested the younger cousin; however, they still are searching for the 18-year-old cousin.
Sexual abuse has become rampant in India. According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 93 women are raped in India every day, and most of the victims know their perpetrators. The NCRB reports the women typically are between 18 and 30 years old (15,556) and 14 and 18 years old (8,877).
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It also has become increasingly common for victims or their families to request an exception to the late-term abortion ban. The Supreme Court of India has heard several cases in the past few years involving young pregnant girls who are victims of rape.
The high court has granted several exceptions and prohibited others. Just last week, the high court spared a 32-week unborn baby and its 10-year-old mother from abortion. The 10-year-old girl became pregnant after she allegedly was raped by her uncle, the Deccan Herald reports. Doctors who examined her said it is in her best interest to give birth to the child.
In May, however, the Supreme Court of India granted permission for another 10-year-old rape victim to have an abortion when she was about 20 weeks pregnant. In that case, the girl’s stepfather allegedly raped her.
Dr. Ashok Chauhan, a panelist in the case, described the situation as “borderline” because the girl was approximately 20 weeks pregnant. The panel also mentioned concerns about the young girl’s physical and mental health.
Similarly, in 2015, the court gave an exception to a 14-year-old rape victim who was past 20 weeks pregnant. At the time, the BBC reported a team of doctors decided the girl was not physically or emotionally fit to have a baby.
As LifeNews previously reported, the first judge involved in the case, Abhilasha Kumari, ruled differently. He said it was a difficult decision but concluded that the unborn baby is innocent just like the victim.
Kumari said: “Whatever be the circumstances in which the child was conceived, whatever the trauma of the young mother, the fact remains that the child is also not to blame for being conceived. It did not ask to be born. The child is innocent, just like the victim, its mother.”
However, the country’s Supreme Court overturned his ruling and allowed the unborn baby to be aborted.
At 20 weeks, an unborn baby already is fully formed and close to the point of viability (about 23 weeks). Late-term abortions also are risky and can be deadly for the mother as well as her unborn child.
