The much-awaited Assisted Reproductive Technology Bill (ART Bill), being formulated by the union health ministry to regulate thousands of infertility clinics that have mushroomed in the country over the years, will be introduced during the next session of Parliament as the ministry is presently giving final touches to the draft bill.

According to senior officials in the health ministry, who are actively involved in finalizing the bill, the union law ministry has returned the bill to the health ministry with some minor clarifications which will be sorted out soon. This is the second time the law ministry has asked for clarifications from the health ministry on the bill. The bill has been pending with the law ministry for a long time now for its mandatory clearance. Earlier, the law ministry had found several lacunae in the bill and had asked the health ministry to make the necessary changes in the bill. The health ministry had then modified and resubmitted the bill to the law ministry.

Officials said that the health ministry will once again send the bill to the law ministry with the necessary clarifications. Once the law ministry gives its mandatory approval, the bill will be sent to the cabinet for its approval for introducing the bill in Parliament.

The bill has been drafted by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and has been given final shape by the ministry after almost four years of inter-ministerial and government-public debates and discussions. The bill has been waiting for quite some time for the nod from the department of law, after the ICMR had completed all the scientific part of the bill.

The bill, once it gets the Parliament nod, will provide for a national framework for the regulation and supervision of assisted reproductive technology (better known as infertility clinics) and matters connected therewith or incidental thereto. Apart from putting strict parameters for the establishment of an infertility clinic, the bill also defines the minimum requirement regarding staff in an infertility clinic and minimal physical requirements for a clinic.

The government felt the need for a Bill regulating the infertility clinics in the wake of mushrooming of infertility clinics in the country since the early 80s. In the Indian context where barrenness is looked down upon, infertile patients look up to ART as the last resort to parenthood. Many of these technologies require enormous technical expertise and infrastructure.

But, in the absence of a regulation, many of these clinics do not have adequate trained manpower and infrastructure facilities to deliver these highly sophisticated technologies and even services provided by some of these clinics are highly questionable. In some cases, the infertile couples are being cheated by providing relatively simple procedure and charged for complicated and expensive procedures. By enacting a Bill, the government wanted to control these violations.