Controversy around surrogacy law in India is due to the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021 and the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Act, 2021 (ART Act), which have been criticized as discriminatory, exclusionary, and arbitrary, and negating reproductive rights. The law specifies who can go for surrogacy, with whom, and in what manner, and bans commercial surrogacy, making it a non-bailable and non-compoundable offense to undertake commercial surrogacy. The people who, as per the State, can be trusted for being given access to surrogacy are limited, such as only an Indian man and woman who are legally married, within specified age groups, with no surviving biological, adopted, or surrogate child, and must suffer from a medical indication necessitating gestational surrogacy. This law has been challenged before the Supreme Court for its constitutional validity, as it impairs the reproductive rights of individuals and is based on arbitrary classifications.
TAGS: surrogacy law India surrogacy regulation bill commercial surrogacy altruistic surrogacy gestational surrogacy reproductive rights.
