Beyond The Blueprint: Are Designer Babies Patentable in India?

Over the last decade, innovations have increased, and the importance of the human healthcare field has also grown. Recently, the University of California and the Broad Institute began battling over the patents related to CRISPR CAS - genome editing. CRISPR CAS9, or Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats, is a kind of precise molecular scissor that scientists use to edit faulty genes. Gene editing has its pros and cons. On the one hand, it is accepted that gene editing resolves children's health issues and provides security to future generations. However, on the other hand, it becomes crucial when it is used to design babies. The natural birth process of human life is being tampered with for selfish motives. Moreover, what would the impact of the altered genes be on the next generation? It may pose a threat to humanity. Every family may not be able to afford a beautifully designed baby. It may also raise questions on the constitutional validity of the practice. Has nature transferred the app to design babies into human hands? Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), protection for designing babies, raises a number of difficult technical and ethical-legal issues. Designing of babies is still developing and needs to be regulated. China, the US and India have used the technology successfully. There is a need to interpret the concept of designer babies through the lens of the Patents Act 1970. The paper proposes to draw the boundaries for the issues related to designer babies.