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High Level Reading Comprehension for IBPS Clerk Mains will help you learn concepts on important topics in English Section.This “High Level Reading Comprehension” is also important for other banking exams such as IBPS PO, IBPS Clerk, SBI Clerk, IBPS RRB Officer, IBPS RRB Office Assistant, IBPS SO, SBI SO and other competitive exams.
High-Level Reading Comprehension: Set – 50
Directions:(1-10) Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions. Certain words are in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.
Children of men, a British-American science fiction movie released in 2006, was based on a 1992 novel of the same name by the famous crime fiction writer P.D. James. The central theme of the novel, set in 2027, is global infertility. The story is about how a set of characters, mainly immigrants to the United Kingdom, help “deliver” a baby in a highly militarized and anti-immigrant environment. The book and the movie describe a fictional situation. Yet, infertility is a growing reality in parts of the developed world. Fifteen per cent of couples around the world are estimated to be infertile.
Infertility rates over the last one and a half decades spurred a human extractive industry euphemistically called “surrogacy”, involving huge amounts of money, mostly at the cost of the surrogate, who typically belonged to poorer sections of society. While some 15-odd countries had a blanket ban on surrogacy, there were others that allowed it and recognized children born out of surrogacy. India was among the leading countries that supplied surrogates to a rich clientele. The legality of such arrangements was governed by the Indian Contract Act and guardianship laws.
On August 24, the government approved, through a Cabinet decision, the introduction of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2016. The proposed piece of legislation bans all forms of commercial surrogacy and allows only “ethical altruistic surrogacy”. It will regulate surrogacy by establishing a National Surrogacy Board, State Surrogacy Boards and other appropriate authorities in the States and Union Territories. The legislation is aimed at “effective regulation of surrogacy, prohibit commercial surrogacy and allow ethical surrogacy to the needy infertile couples”. It allows all infertile married couples to benefit from “ethical surrogacy”
The logic is that India became a “surrogacy hub for couples from different countries” and there were several instances of unethical practices, exploitation of surrogate mothers, and abandonment of children born out of surrogacy and of intermediaries importing human embryos and gametes. The government also relied heavily on the 228th report of the Law Commission of India, which recommended prohibition of commercial surrogacy.
The Bill allows only infertile Indian couples to opt for surrogacy. It bans foreigners and overseas Indians, unmarried people, single men and women, couples in live-in relationships or couples in same-sex relationships and married couples with one or more children, either adopted or biological, from using surrogacy. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who headed the Group of Ministers that finalised the Bill, told the media that surrogacy was banned for foreigners and PIOs (people of Indian origin) as divorces were common in foreign countries. She said, too, that same-sex couples and couples in live-in relationships could not be allowed to use surrogacy because it would go against the Indian ethos. The Bill has been selectively carved out from the more comprehensive Assisted Reproductive Technology, or ART, (Regulation) Bill, 2014, drafted by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in 2010, which viewed surrogacy as a medically accepted practice and looked into the entire gamut of reproductive technologies. Intensive consultations involving public health experts and women’s organizations were held on it, but it was never taken up by Parliament.
The proposed legislation deals with the issue in a limited manner and is based on assumptions that may not be true. (For instance, there may be an exploitative content in altruistic surrogacy, too.) It passes an unnecessary value judgement on single parents, live-in relationships and same-sex relationships. It conveys a political message that is in consonance with the regressive world view of the ruling party in the way in which it makes surrogacy available to only married heterosexual couples. Earlier, surrogacy was available to single men and women and same-sex couples, despite same-sex relationships being outlawed in India.
It is, however, equally problematic to assert that the new Bill restricts the autonomy of women over their bodies and their reproductive rights—the right to be a surrogate. Such a view is based on the assumption that women who become surrogates do so willingly and voluntarily, with everything else in society being equal. That, unfortunately, is not true. The “income” of the surrogate is seen as empowering as she is able to use it to feed, clothe and educate her family. Clearly, the income from surrogacy was a “surrogate” for the state’s own inability to provide non-exploitative options of livelihood for its people.
The larger issue is that the Bill continues to consider surrogacy one of the means available to help infertile couples and does not therefore address the question of banning surrogacy altogether, as some countries have done. Had the government done so, it would have signified a progressive shift from the patriarchal notion of progeny that places a premium on women’s bodies. The autonomy of women, reproductive or otherwise, was never at play in the business of surrogacy. In the interviews that conducted with surrogates and egg donors in Delhi some years ago, none of them said that they did it of their own free will; in fact, they had a deep sense of shame as what they did was not accepted in their culture. The driving compulsion was economic and not any emancipating notion of autonomy.
The notion of regulating the surrogacy industry came up soon after the Indian government legalized it in 2002.The idea that a practice that had flourished with impunity could be regulated on ethical grounds was the biggest fallacy in the first place. It was not the exploitation of women that was of concern here but procedural complications. The only semblance of regulation was in the form of ART guidelines of the ICMR, guidelines that were meaningless as they lacked a statutory backing.
In February 2015, a Supreme Court advocate, Jayashree Wad, petitioned the apex court for orders decreeing that commercial surrogacy was illegal and violated the rights of Indian women and children under Article 21 of the Constitution. The petition contended that it was unethical and against public policy, amounted to the “exploitation of womanhood”, and exposed the child to various risks. It sought a ban on all commercial surrogacy contracts and prohibition of all doctors, hospitals and other institutions from aiding and abetting commercial surrogacy. In 2010, the apex court, while deciding a case (Union of India vs Jan Balaz & others), observed that larger issues of the rights of a child biologically belonging to foreign parents and born to a surrogate mother needed consideration.
The first documented case of gestational surrogacy dates to 1985. The same year, Britain passed the Surrogacy Arrangement Act, which prohibited commercial surrogacy. In the historic case of Baby M in 1986, a surrogate mother in the United States refused to give custody of the child to the biological mother. A court invalidated the surrogacy contract and awarded custody to the commissioning parents and visiting rights to the surrogate. In India, the first baby through gestational surrogacy was born in Chennai in 1994. In 1998, a fertility centre opened in Anand district, Gujarat. A year later, a doctor couple opened an infertility clinic that became a popular hub for foreigners. Anand soon became the centre of the country’s surrogacy industry.The website of this particular clinic claimed that 500 surrogate mothers had given birth to babies there. This unabashed promotion of surrogacy without any regulation, save for contracts between the parties concerned, and with scant legal protection for the surrogate drew criticism.
1.Why did the government ban surrogacy for foreigners, PIOs and same-sex couples?
a. some surrogate mothers end up with serious complications or loss of their reproductive organs after a surrogate birth
b. as foreigners don’t care of their child and let them be independent at the very young age without building their proper mindset
c. as divorce is common outside India and same sex marriages would go against the Indian cultures and ethics.
d. foreigners do multiple marriages and don’t care of any of the child and same-sex people need surrogacy just to prove to society
e. surrogacy gives rise to various unethical practices in India
2.For which of the following reason did the Indian government imposed a regulation on surrogacy by establishing a National Surrogacy Board, State Surrogacy Boards and other appropriate authorities in the States and Union Territories?
A. Exploitation of surrogate mothers
B. Import of human embryos and gametes
C. India became a surrogacy hub for couples from different countries
D. Abandonment of children born out of surrogacy
a. Only B
b. Only C and D
c. Only A and B
d. All except B
e. All A, B, C and D
3.Which of the following led to the prohibition of commercial surrogacy by Britain?
a. when it was submitted that the right to health is constitutionally protected right, accordingly interpreted, upheld through judicial precedents in innumerable cases
b. when the neighbouring countries legalized the same sex surrogacy for their citizens
c. the historic case of Baby M in 1986, where a surrogate mother refused to give custody of the child to the biological mother
d. decrease in surrogacy contracts as surrogacy became commercial which was not safe for the child
e. increase in number of fraud cases as by the name of surrogacy people started doing fraud businesses.
4.The Surrogacy Bill passed by the government is mainly aimed at?
a. regulation of surrogacy involving mostly surrogates from poorer section so that they could earn money
b. making India among the leading countries that supplied surrogates to a rich clientele
c. effective regulation of surrogacy, prohibition of commercial surrogacy and regulation of ethical surrogacy
d. increasing commercial surrogacy to increase the number of newborn as only number of population matters
e. including various forms of ease of surrogacy so that everyone could get benefit from it
5.What would be the consequences of banning surrogacy in India as per the passage?
a. it will expose women to exploitation
b. the ever-increasing demand for surrogacy in India will be satisfied by other countries
c. surrogacy arrangements will taking place in ignorance of law to cater to the needs of the parties involved in the surrogacy transaction.
d. it would signify a progressive shift from the patriarchal notion of progeny placing women’s bodies at premium
e. All of the above
6.Which of the following is closest in meaning to the word impunity as used in the passage?
a. accordance
b. consensus
c. immunity
d. synchrony
e. hazard
7.Which of the following is closest in meaning to the word euphemistically as used in the passage?
a. egoistic
b. grating
c. raspy
d. brassy
e. extenuative
8.Which of the following is closest in meaning to the word abandonment as used in the passage?
a. jarring
b. relinquish
c. anguish
d. torment
e. perturbation
9.Which of the following is farthest in meaning from the word emancipating as used in the passage?
a. dependent
b. liberty
c. existence
d. inundate
e. furtive
10.Which of the following is farthest in meaning from the word altruistic as used in the passage?
a. concealed
b. abdicate
c. egocentric
d. covert
e. forsake
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