Chandigarh: Punjab government’s health department believes that parents of slain Punjabi performer Sidhu Moosewala opted for in vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment in Bangkok, ThePrint has learnt.
A day after the Bhagwant Mann administration faced flak over the alleged harassment of Moosewala’s parents following the birth of their second child, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Punjab Thursday issued a show cause notice to its top health official.
Ajoy Sharma, principal secretary (health), has been asked to explain why it was not brought to the notice of the minister concerned and the CM that the Centre had sought a report about the IVF treatment availed of by Moosewala’s mother, “given the significance of the issue”.
Sharma has been asked to respond within two weeks.
Sources in the office of the Civil Surgeon Bathinda told ThePrint that a team of three officials was constituted by the civil surgeon and sent to the IVF Centre in Bathinda, where the delivery of the child took place, to gather information about the newborn. The report was submitted to the director, health services (family welfare), which was then forwarded to the Centre.
The team, sources added, was constituted under Section 14 of the Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) Act 2021 which provides for the appropriate authority, which in this case, is the director, health services to seek any document, or summon a person or search any place to ensure that the act has not been violated.
The team in its report submitted Thursday stated that it had not caused any inconvenience to the hospital authorities or to Moosewala’s family.
Their report, said sources, stated that the couple opted for IVF treatment at a centre in Bangkok in 2023 and approached the IVF centre in Bathinda after the second month of the pregnancy. The report added that the mother had to be hospitalised twice at the IVF centre in Bathinda owing to complications arising during the course of the pregnancy, it is learnt.
Reacting to the show cause notice issued to the principal secretary (health), Partap Singh Bajwa, Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, wrote on X that CM Mann ‘scapegoated’ Ajoy Sharma to ‘save his own skin’.
Now Punjab CM @BhagwantMann has put the entire blame on Principal Secretary Health Department Ajoy Sharma. However, in reality, the #CMOPunjab was fully aware of Centre’s letter to the Health Department of Punjab.
After facing a huge backlash from the entire Punjab, in their… pic.twitter.com/O5O5UrXPVA
— Partap Singh Bajwa (@Partap_Sbajwa) March 21, 2024
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Controversy over Moosewala’s baby brother
On Tuesday night, Moosewala’s father Balkaur Singh had in a video message alleged that a team of Punjab government harassed and questioned him about the legality of the child born through IVF.
After Mann came under attack from the Opposition over the issue, it was revealed that the Union health ministry had sought a report from Punjab’s health department about the birth of a child to Moosewala’s parents.
The Centre wanted to know how Moosewala’s mother Charan Kaur — aged 58 — underwent IVF treatment given that the ART Act, 2021 does not allow a woman beyond the age of 50 years to conceive through IVF.
In an interview to a YouTube channel, Talks with Rattan, Balkaur Singh said Wednesday that he and his wife opted for IVF treatment abroad since they knew that government regulations in India do not allow a couple their age to become parents through ART. “I’m not a child or an uneducated person who doesn’t know the laws of this country. I have remained an ex-serviceman and I will never go beyond the laws of my nation,” he said.
“I am fully aware that my wife and I could not have undergone this treatment in India. On our return (after the treatment), we reported the pregnancy to the civil hospital in Mansa as is required under the rules. I would have given all the details to the Punjab government as well in due course of time but to send a team and harass us even as my wife is still in the hospital and I am undergoing treatment for high blood pressure is inhuman to say the least,” said Balkaur Singh, who lost his only child Shubhdeep (Sidhu Moosewala), an internationally renowned singing sensation in a drive-by shooting in May 2022.
Singh added that the team sent by the Punjab government to probe the legality of his newborn child grilled him over the IVF treatment sought by them and also caused a lot of inconvenience to the team of doctors his wife was under the care of, in Bathinda, after the treatment.
“Now I refuse to cooperate with any person sent by the government. I challenge Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to go ahead and lodge an FIR against me under the rules and then I will respond,” he said. Admitting that he and his wife are at an age when they should be having grandchildren, Singh said his wife went through a lot during the pregnancy.
“I would go into my room and cry on seeing her condition,” he said.
Charan Kaur was hospitalised on 27 February after which she remained in the hospital and delivered a healthy baby on 17 March.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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