Central Supervisory Board: Centre replaces four member entries

The Centre has replaced four membership entries on the Central Supervisory Board under the prenatal diagnostic law with posts from Kerala, Lakshadweep, Madhya Pradesh and Ladakh, according to a Ministry of Health and Family Welfare notification dated 3 November 2026. The notification also lists officials from Maharashtra, Bihar, Delhi and Uttarakhand as special invitees, a category distinct from board membership.

The ministry’s notification, S.O. 6018(E), gives the four members a term of one year from the notification date, or until further orders, whichever is earlier. The special invitees are listed until further orders, without the same one-year limit.

The measure concerns the board constituted under the Pre-conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, 1994, commonly called the PC&PNDT Act. It changes specified entries in an existing board notification rather than replacing the law or announcing a new regulatory requirement for diagnostic facilities.

The Gazette of India issue carrying the notification is dated 4 November 2026. That publication date is separate from the notification date, which the ministry uses as the starting point for the members’ tenure.

Four posts substituted in the membership list

The ministry has substituted entries at serial numbers 19 to 22 under the heading for appointments made under Section 7(2)(g) of the Act. Each replacement is identified by an official position, not by the personal name of its holder.

For Kerala, the designated member is the State Appropriate Authority-cum-Additional Director (Family Welfare) in the Directorate of Health Services. An Appropriate Authority is part of the machinery responsible for implementing the Act, as described in the ministry’s Standard Operating Guidelines for District Appropriate Authorities.

Lakshadweep’s entry is the Mission Director of the National Health Mission. Madhya Pradesh’s entry is the Principal Secretary responsible for Health and Family Welfare, while Ladakh’s is the Commissioner/Secretary responsible for Health and Family Welfare, according to the notification.

The ministry invokes Section 7, read with Section 8, as the legal authority for the membership amendment. The instrument being amended is S.O. 85(E), dated 5 February 1997. In practical terms, the Centre has changed four positions in that earlier notification’s membership list; the new document does not reproduce the complete composition of the board.

The notification’s historical note records successive amendments to the original instrument, including S.O. 1987(E), dated 21 April 2026. It does not reproduce the outgoing entries or explain why the four substitutions have been made.

Special invitees have a different role

The special invitees listed by the ministry are the Health and Family Welfare Secretaries of Maharashtra, Bihar and the National Capital Territory of Delhi, along with Uttarakhand’s Secretary for the portfolio identified in the notification as “MH& ME”.

For these invitations, the ministry cites Section 11(1) of the Act together with Regulation 5 of the Central Supervisory Board (Transaction of Business) Regulations, 1999. Those regulations explain the distinction between participation as an invited person and participation as a member.

Regulation 5 allows the Member Secretary, with the Chairman’s approval, to invite a person whose assistance or advice the board wants for carrying out the Act or its rules. Members must be informed of that person’s presence and the assistance or advice sought.

An invited person may join discussions relevant to the purpose of the invitation but has no right to vote at the meeting, the regulations state. The four special-invitee entries therefore should not be read as four additional voting membership appointments.

The same regulations set out how board business is conducted. They prescribe a quorum of eight members, meaning the minimum attendance required for a meeting. Where views differ, decisions may be taken by a majority of members present and voting, with a casting vote for the Chairman or other presiding person if votes are tied.

Oversight appointments, not new clinic rules

The ministry’s April 2016 Standard Operating Guidelines, prepared in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund, describe the Act’s purpose as preventing sex selection before conception or thereafter and preventing misuse of prenatal diagnostic techniques for determining foetal sex.

Those guidelines distinguish the implementation responsibilities of district Appropriate Authorities from the wider institutional arrangements, including the Central and State Supervisory Boards. They describe district authorities as implementers of the Act, assisted and advised by advisory committees.

An earlier record illustrates the central board’s work. According to the minutes of its meeting on 13 October 2014, the board considered implementation issues in states, the powers of Appropriate Authorities and regulatory mechanisms concerning ultrasound machines. Expert committee proposals on clarifications, guidelines and amendments were placed before it for consideration.

That historical record provides context for the institution whose membership entries have now changed. It is not an agenda for the newly listed members: the November notification does not announce a board meeting or specify matters they will consider.

The operative provisions of S.O. 6018(E) are confined to the membership substitutions, their tenure and the special invitations. The ministry has not used this notification to alter diagnostic-facility registration requirements, introduce an inspection programme or prescribe new penalties.