The seemingly irreversible demographic decline of the Parsis may be stalled by surrogacy, and that too, without offending orthodox sensibilities.
According to Communicative and Integrative Biology, an expert US based publication, 300 to 400 million sperms are released in a single ejaculation. Of course, only a fraction of these sperms are healthy, fast-moving, capable of fertilizing an egg and causing a pregnancy. In nature’s greatest lottery, out of every 5,000 sperms in the utero-tubal junction, only 1,000 reach the fallopian tubes and out of these 1,000 only 200 get near an egg; and then one lucky sperm manages to fertilize it.
Illustration by Farzana Cooper
The luck of Parsis in this lottery must be the worst in the world. Decades ago — and in the name of Ahura Mazda, this is a true story — two middle aged Parsi ladies in a BEST bus unwittingly summarized this state of affairs, sighed and said, "Arré dikra! Aapuné tau luck bhi nai né f___ bhi nai (we have neither luck nor sex). Is it time to shake off such despondency?
Even the mainstream orthodox Parsis are no longer in denial mode about the demographic decline. Khojeste Mistree, the flagbearer of their cause, often blasted Parsiana’s statistics as misleading. Not anymore. In private conversations they sheepishly assert that the Zoroastrian faith will surely survive. But when asked what about the Parsi community, that most precious anthropological rarity? Feet then begin to shift. We, however, ought not to give up so easily.
A declining fertility rate is a lesser problem than the declining marriage rate. Earlier we married late; now we are reluctant to marry at all. It’s a very Japanese problem where entire villages are being wiped out without a single childbirth in 50 years. Demographic experts place the most blame for this reluctance to marry on a society which still overwhelmingly believes that there should be no child without marriage.
Our efforts at community matchmaking have benefited only the caterers at such events. The few alliances which are struck are between those who have neither the inclination nor the ability to reproduce. Late marriages translate into worsening birth rates. The objective is companionship and not parenthood. Even the old age home in Navsari run by those inspired missionaries Bachi and Dinshaw Tamboly spares space in its otherwise action packed annual report for news about 75-year-old Merwan tying the knot with 69-year-old Freny (names changed) and being in heavenly bliss. Great human story indeed, but sad from the community’s perspective.
Whether the promised Saoshyant of the Khshnoomists (the second coming of the Lord) appears or not, technology can help Parsis. So, suspend cynical disbelief when you read the following paragraphs, however preposterous they may sound at first blush.
Our highly individual centric approach to life coupled with gross indifference to the fate of the community along with absence of any socioreligious reason to bear a child (salvation requires a son to light the funeral pyre in Hindus) have brought us close to extinction. Instead of trying to change this mindset, with not much chance of success, let us focus on those who want a child but are constrained by factors like unexplained infertility, or health risk in bearing a child or lack of money.
This category, small though it may be, wants to bring up children nevertheless. The entry of a child no longer derails the mother’s working life for more than a year or so. Breastfeeding, while highly desirable, is not mandatory; so it is not an issue when older mothers cannot do it. Substitute methods confer only slightly lower immunity levels to the child than mother’s milk.
In simple terms, gestational surrogacy means a woman carries the fertilized embryo made of the biological parents’ egg and sperm. In India, after 2022, non-commercial or altruistic surrogacy is legal for married heterosexual couples (no longer for singles or same sex couples), subject, of course, to several conditions.
So, Cawas, 55, and his wife Meher, 45, unable to bear children due to a health risk or infertility complications can have a biological child by fertilizing an embryo using Cawas’s sperm and Meher’s egg. This embryo is then placed in their friend Shakuntala’s uterus. The resulting child will be Parsi Zoroastrian even though Shakuntala is not a Parsi. Why Shakuntala and not Goolu? Well, Goolus are simply not available. Often such a procedure results in twins. The more, the merrier.
Examine a variation of the above example. Cawas and Meher cannot afford to bring up twins. How about providing financial assistance of Rs 50,000 per child per month? Pipe dream? Of course the self-admittedly bankrupt Bombay Parsi Punchayet, which recently swore an affidavit that it has no money to pay even employees’ dues, will be of no help. However, there are several very cash rich Parsi charitable trusts bereft of ideas on how to use their funds. These trusts can bankroll such child incentive schemes. In a span of five years, if we can produce 1,000 Parsi children by surrogacy, it can trigger off a chain of positive events.
Jiyo Parsi, the Government of India project to increase the Parsi population, has done modestly well. The great Parsi surrogacy endeavor may just be the miracle the orthodox have been eagerly awaiting. So, Cawas and Meher: Here’s looking at you, Kid!
Berjis Desai, lawyer and author of Oh! Those Parsis and Towers of Silence, is a chronicler of the community.