Surrogacy bill: House panel trashed the proposed legislation

A proposed legislation to regulate surrogacy in India was trashed by the Parliamentary panel, which on Wednesday came down heavily on the central government for drafting a legislation with moralistic overtone and being far from the ground realities.

“The altruistic surrogacy model as proposed in the bill is based more on moralistic assumptions than on any scientific criteria and all kinds of value judgments have been injected into it in a paternalistic manner,” the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health said in its report on the Surrogacy (regulation) Bill 2016.

To control the unethical practices in surrogacy and stop exploitation of surrogate mothers, the draft bill proposed altruistic surrogacy only. It said no person, other than a close relative of the intending couple, shall act as a surrogate mothers.

These provisions have been denounced by the House panel, chaired by the Samajwadi Party member Ram Gopal Yadav.
“The proposed altruistic surrogacy is far removed from the ground realities. Expecting a woman, that too, a close relative to be altruistic enough to become a surrogate and endure all hardships of the surrogacy procedure in the pregnancy period and post partum period is tantamount to another form of exploitation. The proposed altruistic surrogacy is far removed from the ground realities,” the panel said.

On women from poor socio-economic background taking up surrogacy as a means of livelihood, the committee said, “Economic opportunities available to surrogates through surrogacy services should not be dismissed in a paternalistic manner. If many impoverished women are able to provide their children with education, construct home, start a small business, etc. by resorting to surrogacy, there is no reason to take this from them.”

“Surprisingly, their other economic options were equally, if not more, exploitative and nowhere close to being as remunerative as surrogacy,” the panel said.

The lawmakers criticised the department of health research for limiting the surrogacy option only to married Indian heterosexual couple, while asserting that several options are available in the law to prevent misuse of surrogacy. However, it did not favour foreigners option for the surrogacy route in India to have their babies.

"But by imposing prohibition on widows and divorced women seems to have closed its eyes to the ground reality. Besides, the decision to keep live-in partners out of the purview of the Bill is indicative of the fact that the Bill is not in consonance with the present day modern social milieu that we live in and is too narrow in its understanding,” it said.