• Couple gets 2nd chance at having baby as HC gives IVF nod to overage husband
    Times of India | 20 August 2025
  • Kolkata: A couple from Narendrapur received a second chance at having a child through IVF after the Calcutta High Court on Monday allowed the man, now 59 years old, through the process despite him overshooting the age criteria by four years.

    Justice Amrita Sinha directed an IVF clinic to permit the couple to undergo the procedures for IVF. The Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) 2021, implemented in 2022, states the service is available to women above 21 years and below 50 and to men above 21 and below 55. The Narendrapur couple married in 2017. After their failed attempts at having a baby, doctors recommended IVF. The couple approached an IVF clinic in 2019, when the man was aged 53, well within the age limit. But their procedure was halted abruptly in March 2020 as the Covid struck. After the pandemic ended, the couple again visited the IVF centre in 2023. Doctors found that though the woman, 45 at that time, was within the age limit, the husband had reached 57. Turned away, the couple approached the Calcutta High Court, seeking permission to go for IVF.

    The HC had recently granted permission for IVF to several couples, among whom one of the spouses had slightly overshot the age limit. The Narendrapur couple's counsel, Debangan Bhattacharjee, relied on a judgment by Justice Sinha in a case, in which the husband had also crossed the age bar. In that case, the childless couple, married for 30 years, desired to go in for IVF, but the husband was 58 years old. In that case, Justice Sinha had observed that it would be "sheer injustice" to the woman if she was not allowed to avail of ARTS as her husband was ineligible. "For the ineligibility of the man, the wife ought not suffer," Justice Sinha had observed.

    Pointing out that the law was enforced in 2022, the Narendrapur couple, in their petition, had raised a question on "what happened to people who had started the fertility procedure before the Act came into being, and suddenly found themselves disqualified during the course of their treatment after the Act was enforced".
  • Link to this news (Times of India)