A doctor who was filmed agreeing to an abortion on the grounds of a baby’s sex and lying to cover it up has been suspended for just three months.
Dr Palaniappan Rajmohan, who worked in a Birmingham abortion clinic, was found out after an undercover investigation by The Daily Telegraph.
Dr Rajmohan was only handed a three month suspension despite a medical tribunal finding that his actions had “brought the medical profession into disrepute”.
Deplorable
The General Medical Council convened a panel to decide whether or not the doctor was fit to practise.
The panel, chaired by Paul Curtis, concluded that he had lied when listing the reason for approving an abortion.
Mr Curtis wrote: “The panel is in no doubt that your actions have brought the medical profession into disrepute and would be considered deplorable by fellow practitioners.”
The panel is in no doubt that your actions have brought the medical profession into disrepute …
Paul Curtis
He added that it was “in the public interest” to suspend Dr Rajmohan with immediate effect.
Infanticide
In 2012, it was revealed that Dr Rajmohan and another doctor had approved sex-selective abortions but the Crown Prosecution Service failed to bring charges against them.
In undercover footage, Dr Rajmohan told a pregnant woman who asked for an abortion because the baby was a girl that to do so would not be fair, and likened it to “female infanticide”.
But he then said he would list “too young for pregnancy” as the reason for the abortion.
Defeated
In February, MPs rejected the opportunity to make sex-selective abortion explicitly illegal when they defeated an amendment by Fiona Bruce MP.
During the debate, Mrs Bruce described the practice as the “first and most fundamental form of violence against women and girls”, and added that objections to the amendment were “flatly untrue” and “offensive”.
However MPs voted to reject Mrs Bruce’s bid by 292 to 201 according to Hansard. The Government allowed a free vote while Labour MPs were directed to oppose the amendment.