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Kerala High Court Lets Trans Man Freeze Eggs After Clinic Refusal

The ruling offers narrow relief, not a final answer on transgender access to ART.

Overview

  • The Kerala High Court, which ruled Friday, directed an assisted reproductive technology (ART) bank to retrieve and cryopreserve petitioner Hari Devageeth’s eggs for future use.
  • The court left the constitutional challenge to Section 21(g) of the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Act, 2021 unresolved, with a detailed judgment still awaited.
  • The Union government argued that the ART and Surrogacy laws cover only a married man and woman or a single woman, a reading it says excludes transgender people from these services.
  • Petitioner Hari, a trans man who had hormone therapy and breast removal in 2023, was denied egg preservation by KIMS Hospital in Thiruvananthapuram after seeking the service in 2024.
  • The order lets Hari act before surgeries that would remove his ovaries, preserving a chance at a biological child later without settling the broader legal question.