Surrogacy and Bollywood

Aamir Khan and Kiran Rao's baby boy through surrogacy has brought the procedure into public focus. A look at how Bollywood tackled surrogacy

Adoption and surrogate motherhood have been a part of Indian cinema and Bollywood for as long as we can remember. Off late, there has been a spate of adoptions in the industry.

Besides Sushmita Sen who adopted a second girl-child, there are directors like Nikhil Advani, Dibakar Bannerjee and Kunal Kohli who have brought home a nanhi pari and are in a state of blessed bliss ever since.

Aamir's decorous declaration of his surrogate parenthood has imbued an all-new dimension to the concept of non-traditional motherhood.

A friend of the couple said on condition of anonymity, "None of us knew about this beautiful development in Aamir and Kiran's life.

The grace and joy with which he has shared the news with everyone is something only Aamir can manage. And by adopting surrogacy he has actually given legitimacy to an unconventional route to pregnancy."

Subject

One hears Aamir and Kiran intend to celebrate the new arrival in their family. At the moment, the film industry is still absorbing the gravity of the announcement, trying to come to terms with it.

One top leading man was honest enough to admit sheepishly, "Mujhe to yeh bhi nahin maloom surrogacy kya hota hai.

(I do not know what is surrogacy). Thanks to Aamir, I found out. But I still don't understand what it entails." The best comment came from a producer who said wryly, "Trust Aamir to push the envelope when it comes to production of any kind."

Ignorance

Ignorance on the subject of surrogacy comes as a surprise. Bollywood and surrogacy have shared a long kinship. Way back in 1983 the underrated director Lekh Tandon made Doosri Dulhan.

This was a film about a childless couple played by Victor Bannerjee and Sharmila Tagore who bring home a prostitute played with blizzard like bravura by Shabana Azmi, to bear them a child.

The film claimed its origins in a play by Anil Barve. Shabana Azmi who played the surrogate mother in Doosri Dulhan, says, "The movie was made in 1982 way ahead of its time. I did a lot of research on the character who was picked up from Kamathipura, but didn't do research on surrogacy.