The Baby Makers: Critics Push for Regulation of India's Booming Surrogacy Industry

As more than 800 million Indians go to the polls this month, the main political party candidates are being urged to finally push through legislation to regulate the country's booming commercial surrogacy industry.

The calls come as increasing numbers of foreigners, including many Australians, pay thousands of dollars to Indian surrogacy centres to fulfil their need to have children.

The industry has been criticised for operating in a regulatory vacuum, and while there are some rules for people who take the journey to India, it is still a minefield for many unsuspecting parents.

Author and critic Kishwar Desai has strong reservations about the lack of legal oversight and what it means for the women who rent out their wombs.

"We're treating these women like animals, like you would do with cattle ... so I think that is something we need to be very careful about," she said.

"It's not the numbers of the women who die - and indeed we may not even know about them because a lot of the clinics are operating without any regulation, without any rules...