The primordial urge to have a biological child of one’s own flesh, blood and DNA, combined with science and money power, coupled with the typical Indian entrepreneurial spin. This is what lies behind the Great Indian Surrogacy Bazaar.

Many a foreign couple with money to spare, and especially NRIs, are flocking to India drawn by its lax laws, affordable medical expertise and women willing to lend their wombs to raise own families. And for most, their hunt ends in a small town of Gujarat: Anand.

It is to Anand that Dr Ifukum Yamada and his wife came looking for a surrogate mother. All went off well till the couple got divorced, and the wife pulled out of the deal. The surrogate mother has quit the scene after delivering the 13-day-old baby, and the infant is waiting in a Jaipur hospital for the case to get settled as Dr Yamada fights for her in court.

However, what has got in the way of Dr Yamada’s plans is not India’s surrogacy laws, for there aren’t any, but adoption laws. While it may be the first such case, Anand has seen pretty much of everything.

India’s surrogacy boon began in January 2004, with a grandmother at the Akanksha Fertility Clinic here delivering her daughter’s twins. The success of Dr Nayna Patel’s enterprise — reported across the world — quickly spawned a virtual cottage industry. Now Dr Patel’s clinic has lower middle-class women walking up and offering to be surrogate mothers. While under the law doctors can’t act as middlemen, business is flourishing in the absence of a law.

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