Protecting the Rights of Surrogate Mothers in India
By Nilanjana S. Roy,
New York Times
| 10. 04. 2011
The plot of the Marathi-language film “Mala Aai Vhhaychy” (“I Want to Be a Mother”) asks a deceptively simple question: Does Yashoda, a woman turning to surrogate motherhood as an escape from poverty, have any claim on the child she is under contract to bear for Mary, an American fertility tourist? In the melodramatic world of Indian cinema, the answer is a heartwarming yes. In real life, it may not be that easy to script a happy ending.
Since 2002, when commercial surrogacy was legalized in India, the surrogacy industry has boomed, becoming a key part of the country’s lucrative medical tourism market. The cost of surrogacy for prospective parents is about $14,000 in India, compared with an estimated $70,000 in the United States. A 2008 study valued the assisted reproductive industry in India at $450 million a year.
Across India, fertility clinics attempt to replicate the success of Akanksha and other clinics in the small town of Anand in the western state of Gujarat, which was the country’s first surrogacy hub. But the boom masks growing concerns about...
Related Articles
By Emma McDonald Kennedy
| 09.25.2025
In the leadup to the 2024 election, Donald Trump repeatedly promised to make IVF more accessible. He made the commitment central to his campaign, even referring to himself as the “father of IVF.” In his first month in office, Trump issued an executive order promising to expand IVF access. The order set a 90-day deadline for policy recommendations for “lowering costs and reducing barriers to IVF,” although it didn’t make any substantive reproductive healthcare policy changes.
The response to the...
Sir Francis Galton, 1890s, by Eveleen Myers (née Tennant)
npg.org
Public Domain via Wikipedia
As has been discussed in recent issues of Biopolitical Times (1, 2), there are, increasingly, companies that claim to be selling parents better babies by selecting the “best” embryos. These services don’t come cheap – think $50,000, or even more, for embryo testing, plus perhaps as much again for IVF and concomitant services. To most of us, that is extremely expensive...
By Margaux MacColl, The San Francisco Standard | 09.17.2025
Designer babies are coming soon to an IVF clinic near you.
Nucleus Genomics, founded by Kian Sadeghi in 2020, when he was just 20, got its start analyzing genomes to weigh a person’s risk of everything from cancer to ADHD...
By Marianne Lamers, NEMO Kennislink [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 09.23.2025
Een rijtje gespreide vulva’s gaapt de bezoeker aan. Zó ziet een bevalling eruit, en zó een baarmoeder met foetus. Een zwangerschap, maar dan zonder zwangere vrouw, gestript van zorgen, gêne en pijn. De zwangerschapsmodellen en oefenbekkens, te zien in de...