Guidelines on surrogacy soon: Renuka

The Ministry of Women and Child Development is working on the regulations that will ensure legal and medical rights...

The Ministry of Women and Child Development is working on the regulations that will ensure legal and medical rights to surrogate mothers and children born to them. Experts will meet on Wednesday to propose the new guidelines.

Various embassies which give visas arbitrarily to children born to surrogate mothers in India will also be taken into consideration as according to ministry officials, the “hassle-free” visa process is further helping foreigners to come here and rent a womb.

“We have seen that couples fly to India, persuade a woman here to rent out her womb for money and then they happily take the child to their country. The embassies play an important role as they give visas without obtaining the details. What if something happens to the surrogate mother? Who is responsible for the surrogate mother and the child? The regulations will protect Indian women,” Minister for Women and Child Development Renuka Chowdhury told The Indian Express.

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As of now, there is no law on surrogacy in India. There are certain guidelines issued by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on surrogacy and Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART), which according to the Ministry, also need to be looked into.

For experts, the major concern is the number of young girls opting for surrogacy, which is also affecting the Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR). So issues like minimum age limit and health conditions that need to be considered will come up for discussion. “There is a free market here. The women here rent out their wombs for economic reasons,” added Chowdhury.

The ministry is of the view that the surrogate mother and the child born to her should have some legal rights. “There should be a legal validity of contract,” said an official in the Ministry. The Ministry’s concern is: “if the child is born with some facial defects, what will happen to him? If during the pregnancy , the woman falls ill, who will pay for her treatment?”

Ministry officials have already spoken to the Law Ministry and the Home Ministry who have given their consent to addressing the issue. With the fertility rate in Germany, Japan and other countries going down, the minister says the countries will fall back on India and hence there is a dire need to address the issue.

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Expressing their concern over various shortcomings in guidelines on surrogacy and ART, the National Commission for Women (NCW) had raised the issues a few months ago with the Ministry.

According to the NCW, there are 3,000 clinics across the country charging Rs 25,000 to Rs 2 lakh for surrogacy. “Many surrogate mothers refuse to hand over the baby to their original parents because they get emotionally attached. There should be provisions for that too,” added the official.