JOIN USIndia’s surrogacy market is thriving. Yet, it belies the several complex and sensitive issues that need to be urgently addressed in order to protect the rights of women who rent out their wombs, says Varshini Murali.
“The newest wave in outsourcing to India,” reads one article in the Forbes, while a piece in The Guardian highlights the need to protect surrogate mothers. The booming nature of the surrogacy business in India is one I needn’t remind you of.
Enough and more has been written about the escalating scale of its demand, and supply for that matter, ever since 2002, the year surrogacy itself was legally recognised in India.
But, legal recognition aside, the matter has revealed itself to be of such immensely complex, and obviously sensitive, nature, thus leading to the stories we read about today: of foreigners flocking to India due to cheaper options available here; the dilemma that arises from a surrogate mother, and in some cases that of the foetus itself, dying unexpectedly and thus not completing her end of the contract; an expose on the women who opt to be surrogate mothers and the conditions that place them there, and of late, the increasing need to have a more precise and air-tight law on surrogacy, one that adequately protects both parties — the commissioning parent(s) as well as the surrogate mother.
The Assisted Reproductive Technology Bill, 2010 is a piece of draft legislation put together by the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) that aims to regulate clinics and doctors engaged in assisted reproductive technologies. Among its many provisions, it also enlists the rights and duties of commissioning parents towards surrogate mothers, and vice versa. The latest version of the surrogacy bill, which is yet to gain approval by the Parliament, begins by clearly stating that the surrogate mother shall “relinquish all parental rights over the child,” extinguishing any doubt therefore, on the surrogate mother’s right over the child.
Another interesting provision is that of the age bar — the Bill explicitly states that only women between the ages of 21 and 35 are eligible to be surrogates. In addition to this, the number of times a woman can contract has been restricted to five live births, including that of her own children.
But the Bill fails to demarcate or limit the number of assisted reproductive cycles a woman can experience. The most striking, and perhaps welcoming, feature however remains that the Bill provides for single parents, unmarried couples, from both India and abroad to opt for surrogacy in India. Such a provision opens up a path for anyone, regardless of their marital status, sexual orientation, or gender, wishing to have a child of their own or start a family.
Loopholes
But, while the Bill might seek to address issues of citizenship, compensation, insurance etc, there is still room for exploitation. A brief glance over the current bill reveals no specific provision regarding the compensation to be paid to the surrogate mother in instances of miscarriage and other complications that may arise due to pregnancy.
The death of 30-year-old surrogate mother Premila Vaghela in May this year, during a routine medical check-up in a hospital in Ahmedabad, clearly brings this issue to the forefront. While the eight-month-old baby had survived, and Premila’s end of the contract was fulfilled, the sad fact remains that the whole business of surrogacy functions, well, like a business. The emotional and moral angle that invariably seeps into such a situation is sadly side-stepped; the approach is more contract-like, just like in any other business venture.
Premila’s instance makes me wonder about the women who do opt to be surrogate mothers. A doctor I speak to at an endoscopy and fertility clinic in Bangalore directs me to Shrusti, an agency that helps source women willing to be egg donors and surrogate mothers. Solemn looking faces stare back at me as I scroll through various profiles displayed on their website. Women across a wide age spectrum are listed here; some are cooks, many are tailors, most are housewives and one, different from the rest, is a school teacher.
This may only be conjecture, but I suppose it might be safe to assume that many of these woman hail from a lower-income category, driven to this, perhaps, simply because of the strains of financial distress. It’s heartbreaking, to say the least, when I read some of the more detailed profiles on other websites. Take for example, Radha (name changed), who explains that she lost her father due to cancer, and that their family business is in trouble. And that she could really do with some extra cash to help her husband and children. Almost all say that they’re here to “help.”
But not all seem to do it for money — one profile even suggested that the surrogate mother simply wanted to enjoy the joy of motherhood, without having to worry over the child’s future!
What, then, about the parents who opt for surrogacy? The current wording of the draft Bill is such that anyone wishing to have a baby can opt for this route. How, I wonder, does it ensure that its provisions are not exploited to the commissioning parent’s advantage? The doctor I speak to reveals that there are women who opt for this route simply because they do not wish to experience pregnancy on their own, for whatever reason, be it the physical changes that pregnancy brings with it, or more plausibly, the ‘hindrance’ it might pose to one’s career path etc. The doctor suggests, instead,
that surrogacy be an option only in instances when a woman can’t conceive on her own, that is, where despite treatment, her womb does not seem to provide the right environment required for conception and impregnation. There has to be a medical indicator, she stresses, while discussing the current nature of the surrogacy bill and what it seems to have excluded from its purview.Other issuesOne might even wonder how issues of ethnicity, caste and other such forms of social stratification are avoided into calculation, while determining an appropriate surrogate mother. The draft Bill provides that there shall be no information advertised regarding the surrogate mother’s ethnicity, descent, caste etc. However, while these details are certainly not mentioned in the multitude of surrogate profiles available on the web, there are mentions of the State they hail from, and the religion to which they belong.
Pouring over the literature available on this topic, it becomes clear that the various ethical, social and legal questions that arise in relation to India’s surrogacy story in effect argue against the manner in which the woman’s womb stands the danger of being commercialised.
And this larger, commercial picture couldn’t get any more clearer than by the fact that I’ve recently encountered 4,000 odd profiles of prospective Indian mothers, in a particular website (www.surrogatefinder.com), twice more than the country with the second highest number on offer — United States of America.