Issues in Reproductive and Genetic Engineering, Vol. 3, No. l, pp. 13-21, 1990 0958-6415/90 $3.00 + .00 Printed in the USA. Copyright © 1990 Pergamon Press plc NEW REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES IN INDIA: A PRINT MEDIA ANALYSIS LAKSHMI LINGAM Women’s Studies Unit, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Post Box 8313, Deonar, Bombay, 400 088, India Synopsis – Based on newspaper and magazine articles, the present paper explores the status of the New Reproductive Technologies in India. The important aspect that is observed is the remarkable difference in the coverage that is given to “test-tube babies” versus sex-determination tests. While on the one hand the arrival of “test-tube babies” receives a lot of fanfare and glorification in the media, on the other hand, due to the widespread debate and campaigning against amniocentesis, the media coverage provides divided opinions on sex-determination tests. To view these technologies as links in the same chain, based on uniform ideologies, is crucial. This paper makes a contribution towards this end. Synopsis– INTRODUCTION Along with sustained protests against unsafe oral contraceptives, the IUD (Intra-Uterine Device), injectables, and sex-determination tests, a new issue on the agenda of the women’s movement in India is to debate and take a stand on the new reproductive technologies (NRTs) and genetic engineering. Though seemingly “new,” these technologies have the same underlying ideology of abusing, disrespecting, manipulating, and exploiting women as “objects.” While the former reproductive technologies were anti-natal – primarily used as measures of population control – the latter function in a pro-natalist context where NRTs are introduced as “therapeutic cure” for infertile women. However, this technology too is anti-woman for it is set within the ideological structure of “marriage,” “children within wedlock,” “the supremacy of biological motherhood,” and it reinforces fertility as an important indicator of women’s status. NKTs have great-er scope than indicated 13