A surrogate mother need not be a “close relative” recommended the Rajya Sabha Select Committee on Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019, which also advocated omission of the 5-year time limit before seeking surrogacy.

This is in the fifteen main changes proposed by the 23-member committee that presented its report in the Upper House on Wednesday. The other significant changes recommended by the Committee include — allowing single women (widow or a divorcee & Persons of Indian Origin) to avail of surrogacy, & increasing insurance cover for the surrogate mother from the sixteen months proposed in the Bill to thirty-six months.

Saying that requiring the surrogate mother to be a “close relative” potentially limits the availability of surrogate mothers, affecting genuinely needy persons, the Committee has recommended the removal of this requirement from the Bill.

It said that “A willing woman shall act as surrogate mother & be permitted to undergo surrogacy procedures as per the provisions of this Act".

Deleting definition

The other major recommendation involves deleting the definition of “infertility” as “the inability to conceive after 5-years of unprotected intercourse” on grounds that it was too long a period for a couple to wait for a child.

The Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019 is yet to be passed by the Rajya Sabha and the committee has held 10 meetings since the Bill was referred to it by the Lok Sabha on Nov 21, 2019.

On Wednesday, Chairman of the Committee Bhupender Yadav presented the report.

Meanwhile, in order to protect the interests of the child born through surrogacy, the Committee recommended that the order regarding the parentage & custody of the child, issued by a Magistrate, shall be the birth affidavit for the surrogate child.

‘Take up ART first’

As a general recommendation, the Select Committee said that the Assisted Reproductive Technologies (Regulation) Bill (ART), which is awaiting Cabinet approval, may be taken up before the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, since the ART Bill primarily deals with technical, scientific & medical aspects, including the storage of embryos, gametes, oocytes, etc. as contained in the Surrogacy Bill.

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