Bangalore:
It’s quite natural for childless couples shopping for sperm to demand both
looks and brains. Dr Aniruddh Malpani, an infertility expert in Mumbai says he
is often inundated with elitist requests from couples seeking sperm donors. But
what’s downright unnatural and not well known, is a more outrageous request:
caste-based sperm, as reported Mansi Choksi and Sharmila Ganesan Ram for TOI.
Dr Saurav Kumar, a Patna
gynecologist, caused an outcry a few years ago when he told a newspaper that
childless couples showed keen interest in knowing the caste of the sperm donor.
According to infertility experts, this is a phenomenon observed not only in
states entrenched with caste biases such as Bihar,
but also elsewhere.
According to Dilip Patil, founding president of Trivector, an infertility
solutions firm,there is a sure preference for Brahmin donors in Mumbai. He
says, ‘’Even among Muslims, couples want to know whether the donor is Sunni or
Shiite.’’ He further added that, ‘’However, going by Indian Council of Medical
Research guidelines, we reveal only the religion of the donor, not the
caste."
Although he dismisses caste-based requests by calling it a ‘byproduct of the
Indian mindset’, Patil willingly obliges queries related to educational and
professional backgrounds, extra-curricular preferences and linguistic skills.