4 held for running prenatal sex determination centre

Dharmapuri: The Morappur police here on Sunday arrested four people, including a woman, for running a prenatal sex determination centre at Vakuthanur village. The accused have been identified as M Sakkammal, 52, of Vakuthanur, S Kaviarasan, 28, M Iyappan, 34, and M Manoj Kumar, 24, all three from the Kallakurichi district.According to a source from the health department, joint director of health M Shanthi received a tip-off that a gang was using a scan machine to determine prenatal sex at Vakuthanur village near Morappur. She also received information that the gang was aborting girl fetuses.A team of officials, including Shanthi, doctors Rajesh Kannan, Raj Mohan, and Morappur police inspector Vanathi went to the spot. “We caught the gang red-handed in a house when they were checking a fetus’ sex using a scan machine,” the JD said.Based on their inquiry, the team lodged a complaint with police. “We have arrested all the four accused,” the inspector said, adding that they also seized the scan machine worth 26,000 and a car worth 3 lakh. tnn