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Delhi HC allows parents of cancer victim to access his frozen semen: Report
The court clarified that there is no legal barrier to using the sperm for reproduction after death, as long as the donor's consent is confirmed.
The Delhi High Court on Friday ruled that the parents of a young cancer patient, who had asked for his semen to be preserved before he passed away, can now have access to it.
The court clarified that there is no legal barrier to using the sperm for reproduction after death, as long as the donor's consent is confirmed and there is no spouse involved.
Justice Prathiba Singh, referencing the Hindu Succession Act ruled that parents are entitled to their deceased son's sperm as they are “Class-1 legal heirs.”
Preet Inder Singh, a 30-year-old diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in June 2020 had preserved his semen before undergoing chemotherapy, which could affect his fertility, Indian Express reported.
The Delhi High Court concluded that reproductive material, like a semen sample, constitutes “property” or “an estate.”
The court directed Sir Ganga Ram Hospital to release Preet Inder Singh's frozen sperm sample to his parents. Singh passed away on September 1, 2020 and later that December, his parents Gurvinder Singh and Harbir Kaur requested the hospital to release the preserved sample.
When the parents failed to retrieve the semen sample, they moved the Delhi High Court in 2021. Represented by senior advocate Suruchii Aggarwal and advocate Gurmeet Singh, they expressed their willingness, along with their two daughters to take full responsibility for any child born via surrogacy using the frozen sample.
The hospital represented by advocate Anurag Bindal argued that the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Act 2021 lacks statutory guidelines for the disposal or use of semen samples from an unmarried individual.
Justice Prathiba Singh, while granting the parents' request said that Preet Inder had given explicit consent for the preservation of his semen sample.
He had expressed his willingness to freeze his semen for fertility preservation, indicating that it was intended for future procreation or the possibility of having children.
“The son of the petitioners intended for the semen sample to be used in order to bear a child. He may have hoped to live after chemotherapy but nature willed otherwise. From the consent given for semen sample preservation, the deceased son’s last wish can also be discerned. When he passed away, the parents being the heirs of the deceased, and semen samples being genetic material and constituting property, the parents are entitled for release of the same,” the bench recorded in its 84-page verdict.
Grandparents, the bench said, are “equally capable of bringing up their grandchildren in a manner so as to integrate them into society… In the present case, the proposed child may be born through an identified surrogate mother or by fertilization of the sperm with a consenting lady who may be identified by the petitioners through IVF”.
The High Court referenced the Hindu Succession Act in its decision, stating that parents have the right to access their deceased son’s sperm, considering it as biological material belonging to him. The Act specifies that in the absence of a spouse or children, parents are classified as Class-1 legal heirs.
