According to the Surrogacy Regulation Act, only those women who are widowed or divorced and between the age of 35 to 45 years can avail the surrogacy route. This implies that a single unmarried woman is not allowed to become a mother through surrogacy.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday (February 5) said that the institution of marriage needed to be protected unlike the West, where children are born outside of marriage, while hearing a petition on allowing surrogacy for unmarried women.

The bench, comprising Justices B.V. Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih, expressed its reservation while hearing the petition of a 44-year-old woman who approached the court seeking permission to become a mother through surrogacy, the Times of India reported.

According to the Surrogacy Regulation Act, only those women who are widowed or divorced and between the age of 35 to 45 years can avail the surrogacy route. This implies that a single unmarried woman is not allowed to become a mother through surrogacy.

“It is a norm here to become a mother within the institution of marriage. Being a mother outside the institution of marriage is not the norm. We are concerned about it. We are speaking from the point of view of (the) child’s welfare. Should the institution of marriage survive or not in the country? We are not like western countries. The institution of marriage has to be protected. You can call us and tag us conservative, and we accept it,” Justice Nagarathna observed.

"That orphanage was a horrible place. I had a very, very bad time there," he said a few hours after his mantra deeksha. "They would beat us all the time, and there was nothing for us to do for entertainment. No games, no music. Nothing good to eat. Horrible schooling. We were forced to work all the time in this tile factory. When we were sent toys, the people who ran the orphanage would just sell them off; we would never get them."

When Manikuttan decided to come to the Massport Arena to have Amma's darshan, he had no idea that Amma had taken over the orphanage {news} in which he had been raised. He found this out only when looking at information about the Ashram's charitable activities during Amma's programme.

"I've held a lot of anger in his heart towards my mother," he said. "Because really she gave me up twice: once when she sent me to the orphanage and a second time when she agreed to my adoption. In a way, I've held a lot of anger towards India too. I mean, I didn't want anything to do with that place, because I just associated it with all the bad times I had in the orphanage. Really bad things happened there. But now I believe there was a purpose behind my mother giving me away and me coming to live in Holland. It was fate. It was so that I could meet Amma here today. Now I want to go back to India. I feel that she is my real home. I want to live a spiritual life. Amma has awoken that desire within me. I am so happy to learn that she took over the orphanage."

The court observed that a leave of 180 days is granted to female government employees on the adoption of a child up to one year of age in line with maternity leave as admissible to natural mothers for proper care of the adopted child.

Bhubaneswar:

Orissa High Court has recently ruled that female employees who become mothers through surrogacy have the same right to maternity leave and other benefits as provided to natural and adoptive mothers.

The single judge bench of Justice SK Panigrahi gave the ruling on June 25 while hearing a petition filed by Supriya Jena, a female Odisha Finance Service (OFS) officer, in 2020.

Jena became a mother through surrogacy, but she was denied 180 days maternity leave by her higher authority in the Odisha government. So, she moved the high court against the government.

Today it is a year since Dennis Knudsen's daughter passed away - and the loss is still very much felt by the celebrity hairdresser.

Dennis Knudsen's daughter, Naomi, was just 7 weeks old when she died of unexplained cot death. The daughter's death came as a sudden shock, and Dennis Knudsen was struck by a great sadness - a sadness that still fills a great deal a year later.

Today is one year since Dennis Knudsen lost his daughter. In the most beautiful way, Dennis Knudsen has made a touching post in which he sends a tribute to Naomi, where he also shares pictures of the little girl.

A bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court.

The Supreme Court on Friday sought the response of the Centre on a petition challenging the bar under the Surrogacy Act that prevents married couples who already have a child from having a second child through surrogacy.

Issuing notice on a petition filed by a married couple, a bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court in a petition filed by IVF specialist Arun Muthuvel in which the amendments to the law barring single unmarried woman and homosexual couples are under challenge. The bench directed the matter to be heard on May 3.

Advocate Mohini Priya, who filed the latest petition, told the court that it challenges the constitutional validity of Section 4(iii)(C)(ii) of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021, which makes an intending couple ineligible to avail of surrogacy if they have any healthy surviving child biologically or through adoption or surrogacy, thus excluding married couples suffering from secondary infertility.

“The choice of reproduction has been held to be a part of the right to life under Article 21 by the Supreme Court, and the said choices also fall within the right to privacy and that the Act severely regulates these rights, so much so, that the fundamental rights under Articles 14 and 21 stand defeated,” the petition said.

A bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court.

The Supreme Court on Friday sought the response of the Centre on a petition challenging the bar under the Surrogacy Act that prevents married couples who already have a child from having a second child through surrogacy.

Issuing notice on a petition filed by a married couple, a bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court in a petition filed by IVF specialist Arun Muthuvel in which the amendments to the law barring single unmarried woman and homosexual couples are under challenge. The bench directed the matter to be heard on May 3.

Advocate Mohini Priya, who filed the latest petition, told the court that it challenges the constitutional validity of Section 4(iii)(C)(ii) of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021, which makes an intending couple ineligible to avail of surrogacy if they have any healthy surviving child biologically or through adoption or surrogacy, thus excluding married couples suffering from secondary infertility.

“The choice of reproduction has been held to be a part of the right to life under Article 21 by the Supreme Court, and the said choices also fall within the right to privacy and that the Act severely regulates these rights, so much so, that the fundamental rights under Articles 14 and 21 stand defeated,” the petition said.

A bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court.

The Supreme Court on Friday sought the response of the Centre on a petition challenging the bar under the Surrogacy Act that prevents married couples who already have a child from having a second child through surrogacy.

Issuing notice on a petition filed by a married couple, a bench of justices BV Nagarathna and Augustine George Masih noted that a matter related to the Surrogacy Act is already pending in the top court in a petition filed by IVF specialist Arun Muthuvel in which the amendments to the law barring single unmarried woman and homosexual couples are under challenge. The bench directed the matter to be heard on May 3.

Advocate Mohini Priya, who filed the latest petition, told the court that it challenges the constitutional validity of Section 4(iii)(C)(ii) of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021, which makes an intending couple ineligible to avail of surrogacy if they have any healthy surviving child biologically or through adoption or surrogacy, thus excluding married couples suffering from secondary infertility.

“The choice of reproduction has been held to be a part of the right to life under Article 21 by the Supreme Court, and the said choices also fall within the right to privacy and that the Act severely regulates these rights, so much so, that the fundamental rights under Articles 14 and 21 stand defeated,” the petition said.

The Supreme Court denied a 44-year-old single woman's surrogacy plea, citing the importance of preserving marriage in India and rejecting Western norms of children born out of wedlock.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused the plea of a 44-year-old unmarried woman to become a mother through surrogacy, saying that the institution of marriage must be protected and preserved in the country, and it cannot follow the model of Western countries where children are born outside of marriage.

A bench of Justices BV Nagarthana and Augustine George Masih stated that a single woman bearing a child outside marriage was the exception rather than the rule in Indian society.

According to the Surrogacy Regulation Act, only those women who are widowed or divorced and between the ages of 35 and 45 years can avail the surrogacy route. This means that a single unmarried woman is not allowed to become a mother through surrogacy.

"It is a norm here to become a mother within the institution of marriage. Being a mother outside the institution of marriage is not the norm. We are concerned about it. We are speaking from the point of view of a child's welfare. Should the institution of marriage survive or not in the country? We are not like Western countries. The institution of marriage has to be protected. You can call us and tag us conservative, and we accept it," the top court observed while hearing the woman's plea.

Petitioner's ex-husband filed for divorce when she was 9 months pregnant & has never seen their son. She asks for exemption from consent requirement so her new husband can adopt the child.

New Delhi: A case involving a former couple has brought a pertinent legal issue before the Supreme Court on the question of consent by a former spouse if a parent and her current spouse want to adopt a child of the former couple. 

The petitioner, a Supreme Court lawyer, approached the top court demanding a direction to the registrar of birth and death in New Delhi to register the adoption deed by her and her now-husband, the child’s stepfather. 

She demanded that this adoption be allowed without her former husband’s consent, asserting that “the peculiar facts in the present case put the petitioner in an impossible situation to seek the requisite consent from her former husband”. 

Among other things, she pointed out that “the former husband has not seen the child even once till date, including the time of the birth”. Narrating the facts of her case, she highlighted the difficulty she faced in approaching her former husband, also a lawyer, for his consent for the adoption.

The Surrogacy Act was enacted to prevent the commercialisation of surrogacy. Our investigation uncovered a clandestine surrogacy racket operating with greater secrecy than organ trafficking.

Surrogacy has been a thriving business in India since the beginning of the millennium. However, unethical medical practices and the exploitation of surrogates have cast a shadow over the practice in the country, which once gained a reputation of being a 'rent a womb' haven for childless couples.

The commercialisation of the unregulated sector gave rise to "surrogacy tourism" as foreign couples flocked to India. This prompted the government to bring legislation to ban commercial surrogacy in 2021. However, clinics exploiting impoverished women and human trafficking for surrogacy have turned out to be a menace despite regulations.

To gauge the ground situation in such clinics, India Today spoke to many fertility centres in Delhi-NCR. A probe reveals that the illicit trade persists and its operations have merely shifted underground.

The reporter, under the guise of a woman looking for a surrogate mother, visited a fertility clinic in Gurugram. Here, the reporter gave her identity as 'Divya'. After being made to fill a detailed form, the reporter is then greeted by a coordinator or an agent at the clinic.