Sydney, Nov. 11: Female foeticide in India hogged the limelight at the 7th World Congress on Bioethics, which began here on Tuesday, as delegates focused on misuse of technology in ?sex selection? and a host of other issues involving scientific research.

?Despite stringent laws by the government in India, the illegal sex selection methods seem to be going on and that is quite disturbing,? Catriona Mackenzie, professor and researcher on bioethics in Australia, told a packed auditorium.

The Indian delegates, who included senior officials of the Indian Council for Medical Research, did not deny the charge. ?What can we say. Whatever the world is saying on female foeticide in India is right,? said the council?s senior deputy director-general, Vasantha Muthuswamy.

?The situation,? Muthuswamy said, ?is very grave and we are asking the government to ensure that the stringent laws updated recently by us are implemented.?

Female foeticide is on the rise in urban and rural pockets of the country, despite the Preconception and Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques Act implemented last year.

The evil of biased gender selection in India and its effect on the sex ratio has been the talking point in Sydney in the last two days. Indian and foreign researchers devoted an entire session of the conference on Feminist Approaches to Bioethics, which preceded the inauguration of the four-day congress, to this. ?The sex ratio has become extremely lopsided leading to serious threats to the girl child in the country,? said Shanthi Krishnaraj, an expert from Chennai.

Biomedical ethics experts from Australia presented a paper on ?the missing girls, discrimination and right to abortion? in India. ?Events in India challenge the thinking about the right of mothers to choose if and when to become mothers. Millions of girls are missing because they were aborted,? argued Heather Draper and Wendy Rogers, medical ethics experts in Australia.

?Selective abortion based on the gender of the foetus is wrong because the right to choose abortion or motherhood does not extend to a right to determine the gender of the child to be aborted or mothered.?

Asked why female foeticide still continued despite stringent laws, the Indian delegates said they would speak extensively on ?misuse of technology? (pre-natal diagnostics). ?The sex ratio in some states have gone down to about 770, causing concern about the ethical and social implications. Nowadays, fertility clinics have also joined the bandwagon. I will speak extensively on the issue,? Muthuswamy said.

ICMR assistant director Nandini Kumar said she would speak on a possible ban on Indian researchers who flout bioethical guidelines. ?When it comes to biological samples, fresh or stored, especially for genetic research, informed consent of individual, family and government is required. But more and more instances are coming to the fore where these guidelines are flouted,? Kumar added.

Meanwhile, the new Unesco declaration on ?universal norms of bioethics?, which was released on Tuesday, evoked mixed response from the delegates with most questioning whether all the laws could be implemented.

The declaration contains controversial points like relatives or legal experts could give opinion on any scientific research, treatment or diagnosis, if the person concerned is incapable of giving consent.

Other declarations on privacy and confidentiality were also hotly argued at the Unesco meeting.