Ever since director Vignesh Shivan announced on Twitter on Sunday that he and his actor-wife Nayanthara have become parents of twin boys, social media has been abuzz with surrogacy rumours.
The fact that the celebrity couple had kids, four months into their wedding was fuel for the rumour mills.
Though Nayanthara and Vignesh have not clarified whether the kids were conceived through surrogacy or not, it is widely speculated that they opted for the method.
Now, the Tamil Nadu Health Ministry has ordered a probe into the possibility of surrogacy and whether they broke the existing laws to become parents.
According to the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Act and the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, enacted in 2021, the couple is deemed ‘eligible’ for surrogacy if they have been married for five years, the wife is aged between 25 and 50 years and the husband is between 26 and 55 years. The couple must not have any living child, biological or adopted, to make them eligible.
As per the law, a surrogate mother has to be a close relative of the couple, a married woman with a child of her own, aged between 25 and 35 years, who has been a surrogate only once in her life.
While these are the rules, the question is how the actor-director couple had babies four months into their marriage.
Tamil Nadu Health Minister Ma Subrahmanian told reporters in Chennai that Nayanthara would be asked for an explanation to see whether there was any breach of regulations.
It is unclear if the couple had opted for surrogacy in another country.
Vignesh announced the arrival of the babies on social media on Sunday. "Nayan & Me have become Amma & Appa. We are blessed with Twin Baby Boys. All Our prayers, our ancestors’ blessings combined with all the good manifestations made, have come 2gethr in the form Of 2 blessed babies for us. Need all ur blessings for our Uyir & Ulagam. Life looks brighter & more beautiful,” he posted.
Even earlier, Bollywood celebs like Karan Johar and Tusshar Kapoor, who aren't married, had children through surrogacy. However, this was before the Act came into force.
