Sajjad Lone released from detention

tion is made based on reports of field agencies and the ground situation.

Lone is the most prominent of the eight Kashmiri leaders released from preventive custody since Sunday. He was a minister in Mufti’s Pdp-led government which was formed in alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The coalition government fell in June 2018. Lone, a former BJP ally, was detained after he joined hands with other state leaders in their opposition to any change to Jammu & Kashmir’s constitutional status.

Srinagar’s deputy commissioner Shahid Iqbal Choudhary announced the release of the two leaders.

The two headed to their homes following their release from a legislators’ hostel in Srinagar that has been converted into a sub-jail. “Last time when I spoke I was detained for six months,’’ Parra said while declining to comment further.

Parra is also a former secretary of the Jammu & Kashmir Sports Council.

HT was unable to contact Lone.

Government officials familiar with the matter said more leaders are likely to be released over the next few days. They added that the three former CMS are unlikely to be among them.

The release of Lone and other politicians comes in the backdrop of the Centre’s attempts to draft former Jammu & Kashmir ministers Altaf Bukhari and Muzaffar Hussain Baig in efforts to restart political activity in the region.

Bukhari and Baig have stressed the need to look beyond Article 370 and advocated the restoration of statehood and domicile laws that will protect employment and land rights.

Bureaucrat-turned-politician Shah Faesal and National Conference leader Ali Mohammad Sagar are among other prominent leaders still in detention.

In New Delhi, opposition parties in Parliament raised the issue of Farooq Abdullah’s incarceration as he completed six months in detention on Wednesday. “Three former chief ministers, including Farooq Abdullah, are languishing in jails for the past six months. They have been put behind bars without giving any proper reason,” Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said. He demanded the release of Abdullah, a member of the Lok Sabha. “Abdullah has been illegally detained.”

Trinamool Congress leader Sudip Bandyopadhyay said the issue was also raised during an all-party meeting. “I would request the government to intimate this House at least about his [Farooq Abdullah] health condition,” he said in the Lok Sabha.

Congress lawmaker K Suresh said it is the responsibility of the government and the House to ensure Abdullah’s welfare and also that he exercises his right as an elected representative.

The Congress, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Nationalist Congress Party, National Conference, and Indian Union Muslim League members entered the well of the House raising slogans seeking Abdullah’s release. Later, Congress members, along with those of several other opposition parties, walked out of the House.

(With inputs from HTC Delhi) for parenthood through a surrogate, as stipulated by the bill.

The Department of Health Research submitted to the committee that the intending couple needed to exhaust all means of having a child of their own with the help of Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) , as “the joy of bearing one’s own child can never be the same as can be had through surrogacy”. It was further submitted that infertility cannot be proven in early years of marriage as sometimes conception happens even after 15 years. “That is why, a reasonable period of five years married life has been prescribed,” the report noted.

The committee, however, was not convinced with the rationale and stated that the five-year wait period was “too long, particularly in conditions like absent or abnormal uterus, irreversible damage or destruction of uterus due to tuberculosis, removal of uterus due to cancer, fibroids, etc. or for patients with chronic medical condition where normal pregnancy is ruled out and it is medically proven beyond any doubt that surrogacy is the only option”.

The committee also recommended doing away with the requirement of obtaining a certificate of proven infertility and suggested that “infertility” be dropped, and “intending couple” be defined as a couple who has “a medical indication necessitating gestational surrogacy and who intend to become parents through surrogacy”.

Another concern surrounding the bill was about who qualified as “intending parents”. While the 2019 bill only permitted married couples, the panel recommended that women between the ages of 35 and 45 years, who are divorced or widowed, also be allowed to opt for surrogacy. However, this privilege remains unavailable to single men, single women, unmarried heterosexual couples, and same-sex couples.

Speaking to HT on Wednesday, Yavad said, “The committee felt that raising a child requires both adhikar and kartavya [rights and duties]. Where there is an option of marriages available, then surrogacy should not be allowed. It [surrogacy] is for those married couples who want to have children but owing to various reasons cannot.”

Though the country’s adoption rules allow single men and single women to adopt children, Yadav said that the surrogacy laws cannot be on par with it.

While the adoption law allows Persons of Indian Origin and Overseas Citizens of India to adopt, the surrogacy bill only permits Indian citizens and Nonresident Indians from opting for surrogacy.

The committee held 10 meetings between December 2019 and February, deliberating with senior officers of the Department of Health Research and stakeholders, including surrogate mothers and intending parents. The committee also visited the surrogacy clinics in Anand, Hyderabad and Mumbai.

In India, commercial surrogacy was a thriving industry estimated to bring in $2.3 billion annually till the first draft of the bill was introduced in 2016 seeking a complete ban on it. Once the Rajya Sabha passes the bill, the ban will come into effect.

In commercial surrogacy, the surrogate is compensated in either cash or kind, which exceeds medical expenses associated with the pregnancy. The bill instead proposed “ethical altruistic surrogacy”, defined as one in which the surrogate is a close relative, who has been married and has had a child of her own.

Though the committee tweaked the provision of who counts as a surrogate, it strongly backed allowing only altruistic surrogacy, stating in its report: “What needs to be pondered over here is that whether such a sublime and divine instinct of motherhood could be allowed to be turned into a mechanical paid service of procreation devoid of divine warmth and affection. To preserve the sanctity attached with the ‘mother’ and ‘motherhood’ it is imperative that surrogacy is altruistic.”

The report also recommended keeping an option for compensating the surrogate mother beyond medical expenses and insurance coverage that includes taking care of her nutritional food requirements, maternity wear, and increasing the insurance cover for surrogate mothers from 16 months to 36 months.

The Committee recommended that the Assisted Reproductive Technologies (Regulation) Bill, which is awaiting the Cabinet’s approval, may be taken up before the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill. The ART bill, which primarily deals with technical, scientific and medical aspects of surrogacy, also recommends the setting up of an ART board. The committee recommended that the Surrogacy Monitoring Board and the ART board should be the same, and the Centre should appoint appropriate authorities at district levels to check exploitation of the surrogates, ensuring that it is not commercialised. maintained at the Olympics at any cost,” said IOA president Narinder Batra. “People can’t be allowed to play mischief at the Games.”

Meanwhile, an official from the Equestrian Federation of Pakistan (EFP) said that if the International Olympic Committee lodges a formal complaint with the body, then it will take the matter up with Usman Khan. “He has chosen the name of the horse and qualified with the same horse, so I don’t think the horse’s name can be changed at this moment,” said Muhamad Irfan Zaafar, head of IT and communication at EFP.

Asked what would be his federation’s stand if the International Olympic Committee intervenes and prohibits Usman from making political statements at the Olympics, Zaafar said the horse would then participate with its FEI identity, a unique alpha-numeric code given to competing horses, instead of its name.

“If it becomes an issue then we’ll first check if Usman is flexible with changing the name,” Zaafar said. “But then we can always use its FEI identity instead of the name.”