The Bombay High Court directed a private hospital here to file a reply to a petition by a couple seeking permission to complete a surrogacy procedure they had initiated before the new Assisted Reproductive Technology and Surrogacy Act came into effect.

A vacation bench of Justices NW Sambre and Anil Pansare directed the hospital's counsel Anita Castellino to file a reply clarifying the current legal position on cases like that of the petitioner couple. The bench further asked the hospital to clarify if the court can pass any orders on their interim prayer seeking to transfer their cryopreserved embryos from the said hospital to another fertility clinic.