270 days maternity leave for TN govt employees having surrogate child

CHENNAI: The State government on Friday approved 270 days of maternity leave for women government employees and teachers to take care of their newborns delivered through surrogacy. A Go was issued to give effect to the approval.

According to the GO, the State government considering the difficulties faced by the women government and teachers in taking care of new born through surrogacy granted maternity leave of 270 days with conditions such as the government employees and teachers should have legally registered for getting their child birth through surrogacy, should have proper medical certificate from the doctor who performed the pregnancy and is valid for only two children.

The maternity leave will be granted for women government employees and teachers from the date of birth of the child and is applicable to all women employees working in government and government undertakings.

The announcement for 270 days maternity leave was made in the state Assembly by Social Welfare Minister Geetha Jeevan on April 21, this year. Taking up the announcement for consideration, the officials of the Social Welfare Department applied the rules for adopted children, where the women government employees and teachers get 270 days of maternity leave, for surrogate children too and issued the GO.

It was also observed in the GO that unlike normal child delivery, where women undergo severe body pain and requires time for recovery, there is no such physical pain involved and so the 375 days maternity leave granted for normal deliveries could not be granted.

Recently, surrogacy became a subject of controversy when actor Nayanthara and Vignesh Shivan announced about their twin boy babies through a surrogate mother and an inquiry was carried out whether the couple adhered to the rules given under the Surrogacy Act.