Mamma Mia!

With commercial surrogacy on a rise, a new breed of professionals help foreign couples track the pregnancy process with surrogates in India

Mamma Mia!

With commercial surrogacy on a rise, a new breed of professionals help foreign couples track the pregnancy process with surrogates in India

The news that they're about to be parents can scare any couple. And when they're having the baby in a foreign land by a surrogate, freaking out is understandable.

As surrogacy in India grows, the need to bridge cultural gaps between the foreign national parents and the surrogate is increasingly becoming important for doctors and patients.
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Israeli national Einat Liner (30) is trying to bridge that gap by helping foreign couples with surrogates in the city track the pregnancy progress right up to the delivery.

Commercial surrogacy was legalised in India in 2002, but the industry is expanding at breakneck speed and between clinic visits and the time of delivery, couples have several questions, while doctors have little time to answer all.

"We've only started with Liner a week ago and hope she can help put our couples seeking surrogates at ease," said infertility specialist Dr Gautam Allahbadia of Rotunda clinic in Bandra.
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Liner has helped four couples from Israel this way.

"With the surrogate's consent, I take and send pictures of the pregnant belly, mail sonographies and ultrasounds and even check on the surrogate every month.
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When the couple arrives for the delivery, I help them out with the parenting process.

"A doctor will tell you where to get medication, but couples need to know where they can buy diapers or baby food.

That's where I come in," said Liner, who charges around Rs 1 lakh.

Docs agree

Liner feels that the practice will pick up, given that Indian Council of Medical Research guidelines now seek to make it mandatory for intended parents to appoint a local guardian to monitor the surrogate's progress.

Doctors too believe that such services help parents reach a comfort zone. "I'd put myself in their place too.

If I were visiting a foreign country with the intention of bringing something back as important as a baby, I would love to meet someone there who spoke Hindi," said Dr Duru Shah of GynaecWorld at Kemps Corner, who's had around 15 cases of surrogates in the last year.

2002
The year in which commercial surrogacy was legalised in India

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