The Sorry State of Indian Surrogates
By Gina Maranto, <i>Biopolitical Times</i> guest contributor
| 08. 06. 2013
The surrogacy industry in India is both booming and changing. A new 168-page report from the Centre for Social Research, a women’s advocacy group based in New Delhi, finds that the industry appears to be shifting from towns like Anand and Amritsar to the megacities Mumbai and New Delhi, which are more easily accessible to international travelers and have higher quality health care facilities. Surrogate Motherhood: Ethical or Commercial documents a range of disturbing conditions: Although the government has guidelines for assisted reproduction clinics, regulation continues to be spotty and current law affords scant protection to the poor, largely uneducated women who are being drafted to serve as incubators, or to the resulting children handed over to primarily foreign clients.
Foreign scholars and journalists have probed the Indian surrogacy business for some years. Within the country, groups like the Sama Resource Group for Women and Health have drawn attention to the broader practices of ART clinics, as in their 2008 publication Cheap and Best, which puts the industry in the context of global medical tourism and examines the...
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