ART Regulation Bill, 2014

In response to a Supreme Court directive, the Central government told the court that it would table the draft of the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Bill, 2014, which has been released for public comments, in Parliament early next year.

The new draft bill makes it clear that no woman “shall act as a surrogate for more than one successful live birth in her life and with not less than two years interval between two deliveries.” Foreigners have been barred from taking the surrogacy route in India, but it has been allowed for non-resident Indians. The 2012 draft of the Bill banned only those foreigners from hiring Indian surrogates whose own countries of origin didn’t recognise commercial surrogacy as Indian practices.

“Surrogate mother shall be an ever married Indian woman with minimum twenty-three years of age and maximum thirty-five years of age and shall have at least one live child of her own with minimum age of three years,” says the draft bill. In an earlier version of the legislation—The ART (Regulation) Bill, 2008—the age bracket for a surrogate mother was 21 years on the lower side and 45 years on the upper.

Acting on a public petition, A bench comprising Justices Ranjan Gogoi and N V Ramana told the government: “You are allowing trading of human embryo. Commercial surrogacy should not be allowed but it is going on in the country. You are allowing trading of human embryo. It is becoming a business and has evolved into surrogacy tourism.”

"The government does not support the commercial surrogacy and it would be limited to Indian married infertile couples only and not to foreigners," the union government said in an affidavit to the Supreme Court. Many women from poor socio-economic background are lured into surrogacy by unscrupulous clinics violating medical norms and ethics and India has literally become a baby factory for foreigners.

The Centre also told the court that: "Import of the human embryo is prohibited except for research purposes based on the guidelines of the department of health research.” In 2013, the Centre had issued a notification allowing import of human embryos for artificial reproduction paving the way for foreign couples to bring in frozen human embryos and rent a surrogate womb in India.

In 2012, India barred foreign gay couples and single people from using surrogate mothers to become parents. A majority of the European nations don’t permit surrogacy.