Introduction
Surrogacy is one of those changes, which has challenged both society and law, in terms of its recognition & regulation. Surrogacy can be viewed as a technique as well as a form of transaction, which parties resort to in order to give rise to new relation towards each other. This relation is based on necessity and desire of the parties concerned to have their own genetically or biologically related child. Surrogacy is a ‘necessity’ for those who are economically vulnerable and are unable to maintain themselves with the help of available resources, and a ‘desire’ of those who are otherwise unable to procreate or conceive the child of their own.
The natural desire to have one’s own child has paved the way for recognizing the new techniques which aim at fulfilling the desire to have a child. Surrogacy is one such technique which is used across the globe. Moreover, surrogacy across India is extremely rampant, and in fact India is being considered as the hub of surrogacy transactions. This transaction is beneficial for both the parties: a commissioning parent, in fulfilling the need to have a child of their own, and a surrogate or gestational mother, to have some economic security through a sure source of livelihood.
History
The roots of Indian surrogacy have its traces in the history and provided evidences of being a century old procedure. The procedure became a successful practice in India with the birth of world’s second and India’s first IVF baby Kanupriya alias Durga who was born in Kolkata on Oct. 3, 1978. Since then the field of assisted reproductive technology or called ART in short has shown fastest developments. The procedure started long back however; there is still no legal recognition of surrogacy in India.
Till date only gestational surrogacy has been promoted that is also in its nascent stage. In addition to it, the laws related to surrogacy are also in the nascent stage. The guiding force between both the parties i.e. the surrogate and the intended parents are just the ART guidelines designed long back. There are no codified laws. They are yet to be adopted and implemented. With the recent growth in the count of Intended parents opting for surrogacy in India, the nation has become the much sought after surrogacy destination.
In India, surrogacy has always remained a debated topic as it has always been discussed upon legal, social and ethical aspects. There have been cases that have resulted in both the favor and sometimes against the practice of the procedure when the attempt did not result in success. However, after many efforts commercial surrogacy was made legal in India in 2002. India has proved itself to be one of the most famous surrogacy destinations preferred internationally. In past some decades there has been enormous growth in reproductive techniques in India that includes innovative door insemination techniques, in vitro fertilization techniques, embryo techniques and much more that has given hopes to childless couples. At one hand where intended parents are much happy to have such a technique available for them, there are some communities, on the other hand who are not in the favor practicing surrogacy in India.
