10th December 2018


'Your child is my child.'

This is not a dialogue from any Bollywood junk cinema; it’s a reality and the words of acceptance for the unwanted child. Again, it’s not a child born out of wedlock, but it’s a child born as the fruit of surrogacy in Cambodia, where surrogacy has been banned since 2016. In spite of this, the poor women go for it to earn a life changing amount as $10,000 mostly from Chinese Couples. This illegal practice sent 31 women behind the bars this June and after a month they were released but with the order to keep the baby as their own and not to give the child to the demander. Cambodia's surrogacy crackdown is unlikely to end the trade as poverty means many women will continue to risk arrest for the chance to earn life-changing sums of money. To restrict the women from this illegal practices, surrogacy is been banned in Cambodia. 
The Cambodian Police have arrested many women in last few months and charged them for violating human trafficking laws, but authorities released them on bail under the condition that they would raise the children themselves. Now instead of receiving $10,000, the women went home with another mouth to feed.
Not only Cambodian but the poor women from Southeast Asia have been on the top for surrogacy for the couples mainly from China. Thailand banned the practice in 2015 after several high-profile cases, followed by Cambodia in 2016. In 2017, an Australian nurse and two Cambodians were jailed for 18 months for operating an illegal surrogacy clinic.



Ban on the inhuman practices are good but the law makers also need to take initiative to eradicate the poverty. Cambodia’s average annual income is Cambodian Riel 60,04,700.00 i.e. $1,490 i.e. Indian Rs. 1, 08,106.97. This is according to the International Monetary Fund. What people will do for survivals?
The surrogate mothers who were arrested already have 2 to 3 children and they don’t have enough work in their hands to earn to meet both the ends daily. Those women decided to go for the illegal practices when they were promised to pay $10,000 mainly by Chinese couples which were a dream amount for anyone in Cambodia. But in the 7th and 8th month of pregnancy many of the women got arrested and the children were now burden for the women and their entire families.



"It is a very difficult situation. I worry that my income will not support the whole family," said Pich, a motorcycle-taxi driver whose wife is carrying what will be their third child. The 40-year-old said he never supported his wife's decision to be a surrogate and that he was ashamed she had gone through with it.
Despite the financial loss, 24-year-old Alisha’s family had welcomed her baby boy. "I agreed to give birth at the provincial hospital and look after the baby, but I don't know how we will get the money to support and raise another child. I will not tell my son what happened in the past," she said. "I won't tell him about his actual Chinese parents," she said.
Members of the other families said the babies are a mixed blessing.
Ros Sopheap, director of the charity Gender and Development for Cambodia, said poverty will likely drive more women to engage in surrogacy - and that few know the practice is illegal. "Very few people are aware of what's right, what's wrong, what's against the law," she said. "The reality is that these women do this because they are living in poverty. So as long as there is a demand for surrogate mothers, they will continue."
Chou Bun Eng, a secretary of state at the Interior Ministry, said the 32 women were released on humanitarian grounds last week, but that the fate of the latest 11 surrogates is unclear. Each case will be judged independently and "law enforcement will become stricter" in the future, according to the official.
It would be difficult for authorities to track down those who organized surrogacy rings, or the Chinese couples who paid for Cambodian women to bear their children. "Even surrogate mothers did not know nor have contact with the one who wanted the babies," said Chou Bun Eng.
Poverty makes the man humble and the acceptance of every situation is high among poor. Many poor Cambodian families also show their love for the new born and welcome the child with the ceremonies. The burden of one more person becomes lighter when the surrogate mothers hear, “Your child is my child.”