Right to privacy under article 21 include right to reproductive choices/

RIGHT TO REPRODUCTION- A CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT

In India, the right to have reproductive choices has been declared as a part of Article 21 of the
Constitution by supreme court in B.K. Parthasarthi v. Government of Andhra Pradesh, AIR
2000 AP 156. The Supreme Court in the case of R. Rajgopal v. State of Tamil Nadu, held that
the right to life includes the right to privacy. A citizen has a right to safeguard not only his own
privacy but also of his family, marriage, procreation, motherhood, child bearing and education
among other matters. The Andhra Pradesh High Court in B.K. Parthasarthi v. Government of
Andhra Pradesh recognized reproductive rights as a fundamental right and upheld the right to
reproductive autonomy of an individual as a facet of his right to privacy. When the concept of
privacy is extended to matters of procreation, states interference or restrictions on procreation
amount to a direct encroachment on ones privacy.

Ban of Surrogacy violates Right to livelihood under article 21 of the Indian

constitution
It is again, a matter of right of those women who are striving to meet their livelihood concerns
and hence, an obligation on the state to recognize or provide a legal validity to surrogacy so that
surrogates can legally opt for it to meet their financial and economic concerns. In fact, the state
has a constitutional obligation to ensure the livelihood of its citizens, by creating or opening new
avenues which may provide them with an opportunity to feed themselves The expression right
to life under Article 21 includes right to livelihood and a right to access resources of
livelihood as fundamental rights.
The ban on commercial surrogacy threatens the livelihood of many poor women in the country
who have been able to educate their children, establish businesses, and financially support their
families through surrogacy. The number of such women, many of whom are sole breadwinners,
is estimated to be more than 100,000.
Hence, the State is under an obligation to make suitable arrangements or to recognize those
techniques that can provide an opportunity to infertile couples and those who are otherwise
unable to have their own genetically or biologically related child.

Article 19(1)(g) specifically, which guarantees the freedom of trade and profession in India.
The surrogacy industry is the source of bread and butter for not only the surrogate mothers but
also the numerous surrogacy clinics in the country. A blanket ban on surrogacy cannot be
justified as a reasonable restriction because it jeopardizes the interests of multiple stakeholders in
this multi-billion-dollar industry.