In India, men aged between 15 and 70 were taken off trains and forced to undergo sterilisation. In Japan, even 9-year-old children were not spared. Will they get compensation?

New Delhi: The Supreme Court of Japan has recently declared illegal the forced sterilization done under a law of 1948. Under this law, sterilization was done in Japan from young to old. This sterilization was done exactly like what happened during the Emergency in India. This matter later became so big that the Indira Gandhi government had to face defeat in the Lok Sabha elections. The Supreme Court of Japan has asked the government to pay 1.65 crore yen to the victims and 22 lakh yen to their families as compensation. The Supreme Court said that this law is against the dignity and respect of the people. Let us know how and in what way sterilization was done during the Emergency. What was that illegal rule in Japan, due to which it took 75 years for the victims to get justice.

Sanjay Gandhi was the mastermind behind forced sterilisation in India

On 25 June 1975, the then Indira Gandhi government imposed emergency in India. Indira’s son Sanjay Gandhi played an important role in imposing emergency. In 1976, he/she got forced sterilization done to control the population. The aim of the five-point family planning was to control the population. In just 19 months, about 83 lakh people were sterilized. In this, children from 15 years to old people of 70 years were forcibly sterilized. So much dictatorship was used in sterilization that whenever the train stopped at many places, the employees of the family planning camps would forcibly catch the passengers and sterilize them. Actually, they too had got the target of sterilization. The result of this dictatorship was that when the general elections were held in 1977, Indira Gandhi lost and the Janata Party came to power.

The police surrounded the village and dragged the girls out of their homes for sterilisation

In fact, during the Emergency in 1975, civil liberties were suspended. At that time, Sanjay Gandhi had aggressively pushed this campaign forward. At that time and later, Indira was accused that the poor population was the biggest target in this family planning program. There were also reports that the police surrounded villages and forcibly dragged men out of their homes and sterilized them. This campaign also found a place in the famous novelist Salman Rushdie’s novel ‘Midnight Children’.

Eugenics law in Japan, sterilization happened due to this rule

In Japan, the Eugenics Law was introduced in 1948, under which a formula was adopted to produce good breeds of humans. According to the rule, disabled or handicapped people were sterilized without giving any reason. The word eugenics was coined by British traveler and scientist Francis Galton in 1883. It meant promoting a particular breed with some desirable qualities. For example, promoting the breed of intelligent people and socially prominent people is eugenics.
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Those who are not fair are prohibited from increasing their progeny

In such a situation, people who are sick or have any genetic disorder have to be prevented from producing their own children. The imperialist government of Japan then forcibly sterilized people by making this law. In this, people of any color other than white people, handicapped and sick people and LGBTQ were banned from producing their offspring.

What is the law and how is it implemented

The Japanese government implemented the Eugenics Protection Law in 1948. One of its aims was to curb the country’s rapidly growing population. This law was abolished in 1996. It was said in this law that its aim was also to protect the health of mothers. Under this law, a person’s reproductive glands were forcibly removed. A physician used to carry out this operation.

Such persons will be sterilized under the law

People suffering from schizophrenia, epilepsy, deafness, damaged hands or feet, hemophilia and criminals were forcibly sterilized. In the name of mental disorder, many people had their private parts operated upon. Even 9-year-old children were forcibly operated upon. It is believed that there were 16,500 people in the country whose consent was not taken for the operation. At least 25,000 people were sterilized during the last 48 years.