Chandigarh, May 29 -- The Punjab and Haryana high court has stayed the Haryana government order of suspending four senior medical officers over "poor monitoring" of sex-ratio measures. On May 18, Haryana health department suspended three senior medical officers and one medical officer for "poor performance" and "failure to ensure" effective monitoring measures related to improving the sex ratio of the state. Those suspended were Dr Tina Anand (SMO), posted at community health centre (CHC) Purkhas in Sonepat; Dr Vijay Parmar, SMO at CHC Radaur in Yamunanagar; Dr Satpal, SMO at CHC Chiri in Rohtak; and Dr Prabha, MO at CHC Sehlang in Narnaul. The trigger for the move was stated to be a drastic dip in the sex ratio at birth (SRB) that Haryana registered in the last four months. In 2025, the state's SRB stood at 923 females per 1,000 male births. However, the health department had not disclosed the current SRB status. The suspended doctors had approached the HC against the decision terming it wholly arbitrary, punitive, non-speaking and violative of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India. "The suspension order has been passed without assigning any specific act of misconduct, without any complaint, inquiry, inspection report or allegation of violation under the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act, 1994 and without affording any opportunity of hearing to the petitioners," the plea said. "Operational guidelines issued by the Union ministry of women and child development recognises improvement of sex ratio as a multi-sectoral, district-driven indicator involving coordinated efforts of the district administration, police, women and child development, health department, education department among others," it said. Under the PCPNDT Act, the statutory responsibility for enforcement lies with the district appropriate authority, headed by the civil surgeon. The bench sought state government's response by October 27....