A bench of Justices BV Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan said that the Gujarat High Court has wasted a lot of time by adjourning the case multiple times.

The apex court was informed by the counsel for the petitioner that the 25-year-old woman had approached the high court on August 7 and the matter was taken up the next day.

He said the high court had on August 8 issued a direction for the constitution of a medical board to ascertain the status of pregnancy as well as the health status of petitioner. The report was submitted on August 10 by the medical college where she was examined.

The top court noted that the report was taken on record by high court on August 11 but “strangely”, the matter was listed 12 days later i.e. on August 23 “losing sight of the fact that every day’s delay was crucial and of great significance having regard to the facts and circumstances of the case”.

The bench also noted that the petitioner’s counsel has brought to its notice that the case status of the matter showed that the petition was rejected on August 17 by the high court but no reasons were dictated in the court and the order is yet to be uploaded on the high court’s website.

“In the circumstance, we direct the secretary general of this court to inquire from the registrar general of the High Court of Gujarat and ascertain as to whether the impugned order has been uploaded or not,” the bench said.

The bench of two judges asked Gujarat’s HC, “Why was the matter stood over to August 23? How can the Court say that report comes on August 10 and then listed 13 days later? How much valuable time was lost?”

Justice Nagarathna said there has to be a sense of urgency in such cases and not a ‘lackadaisical’ attitude in these cases.

The top court was hearing an appeal challenging a Gujarat High Court’s August 17 order. The High Court had rejected the request for termination of a 26-week-old pregnancy of a rape survivor.

Advocate Vishal Arun Mishra had filed a plea and advocate Shashank Singh appeared for the survivor before the Supreme Court.

The petitioner’s counsel told the bench that as on today, the petitioner is pregnant for 27 weeks and two days and shortly, would be approaching the 28th week of her pregnancy.

The apex court has sought a response from the Gujarat government and has ordered a fresh medical examination of the rape survivor, before posting the case for further hearing on Monday.

“We direct the petitioner to appear before KMCRI hospital for being examined once again and the latest status report may be submitted before this court by Sunday evening 6 PM. The same shall be put up before this court on Monday,” Supreme Court said.

Advocate Swati Ghildiyal appeared for the State of Gujarat.

The petitioner’s counsel said as per the report, the termination of pregnancy can be done.

Under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act, the the upper limit for the termination of pregnancy is 24 weeks for married women, special categories including survivors of rape and other vulnerable women such as the differently-abled and minors.

Updated: 19 Aug 2023, 12:40 PM IST