ED cracks surrogacy racket in Hyd

The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) on Friday arrested Dr Athuturi Namratha alias Pachipalli Namratha for alleged money laundering in connection with an illegal surrogacy racket.

The ED’s Hyderabad Zonal Office arrested the accused under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, during the course of investigation into an illegal surrogacy racket allegedly run by her in the name of Universal Srusthi Fertility & Research Centre.

The central agency said she was produced before the Metropolitan Sessions Judge court, which remanded her to judicial custody till February 26.

According to the ED, during her statements recorded after being released on bail in November last year, she remained evasive and non-cooperative despite being confronted with evidence confirming her role in relation to the proceeds of crime and the offence of money laundering.

The agency initiated the investigation on the basis of multiple FIRs registered by Gopalapuram police station, Hyderabad, for charges including fraud, cheating, criminal conspiracy, illegal surrogacy and child trafficking.

Dr Namratha was allegedly providing childless couples with newborn babies through a surrogacy racket she had orchestrated via her clinic, along with her employees and agents. She and others were earlier arrested by the police during the investigation. She was released on bail on November 27, 2025.

During the PMLA investigation, statements of Dr Namratha and her associates were recorded in judicial custody, and searches were conducted at various premises, resulting in the seizure of documents evidencing her alleged involvement in the racket since 2014.

The investigation revealed that she allegedly continued the illegal surrogacy operations even after multiple cases were registered against her and her medical licence was suspended by the authorities, the ED said in a release.

The ED further alleged that Dr Namratha collected huge sums of money from childless couples on the promise of delivering a baby through a surrogate mother. To project the procedure as genuine, their gametes were collected for implantation into a surrogate mother. However, the newborn babies were allegedly sourced from poor and vulnerable parents who were unable to raise the child and had sought to terminate the pregnancy.

A network of agents and sub-agents was found to be involved in the racket, arranging poor and needy pregnant women and luring them with money to give up their child soon after birth.

The ED claimed that Dr Namratha used to pay around Rs 3.5 lakh for a female child and Rs 4.5 lakh for a male child. Such deliveries were allegedly conducted at her hospital in Visakhapatnam after the licence of her Secunderabad hospital was revoked by the authorities.

Further, the birth reports forwarded to the municipal authorities were allegedly forged and reflected the names of the childless couples as parents instead of the biological parents.

The investigation also revealed that several couples were allegedly cheated and large sums were collected from them by way of cheque and cash. A portion of these amounts was allegedly paid to agents and sub-agents as commission and to the biological parents of the trafficked babies.