The Madras High Court has allowed a Bangladeshi woman to donate a kidney to her son

Image used to represent | Photo credit: Getty Images

The Madras High Court has helped a minor Bangladeshi boy by allowing him to undergo a kidney transplant in Chennai with a kidney donated by his mother. The court slammed the Human Organ Transplant Licensing Committee in Chennai for not granting permission after raising doubts about the relationship between the child’s mother and her husband.

Justice GR Swaminathan set aside the rejection order passed by the Authorization Committee on 2 April 2026, holding that it “suffers from a misdirection of law and a complete failure of mind”. The judge directed the commission to immediately allow A. Monica Rani Saha to donate one of her kidneys to her son A. Aton Saha and allow the operation to be performed at Apollo Hospitals in Chennai.

The judge said that the status of mother occupies a “sacred position in Bharatiya culture” and therefore when a woman claims to be the mother of a person by producing documentary evidence, such a declaration should normally be accepted by the statutory authorities without raising undue doubts. In the present case, the mother went to the extent of voluntarily submitting a DNA report.

Further, to establish the relationship between the donor and the donee, they submitted their passports, visas, national identity cards issued by the Bangladesh government, the child’s birth certificate, his class X mark statement, family certificate issued by Kashinathpur Union Parishad, relationship certificate issued by the Bangladesh High Commission representative in Chennai and e-apostille.

Apostille certificate

Emphasizing the importance of the apostille certificate, the judge said India was a signatory to the 1961 Hague Apostille Convention and was therefore bound to trust apostilled public documents issued in other member countries. The Ministry of External Affairs further clarified in 2020 that these apostilled documents do not require any further attestation by Indian missions.

Therefore, the Human Organ Transplant Licensing Committee should have accepted the documents submitted by the mother and son to prove their relationship and should not have denied permission for the kidney transplant by raising doubts about the relationship between the woman and her husband by questioning them orally with the help of a translator, the judge said.

“The only relevant question for the Board to ask was whether the first petitioner (the grantee) was the son of the second petitioner (the donor). Whether the third petitioner was the husband of the second petitioner was irrelevant. It is well settled that if an administrative decision is vitiated by an irrelevant consideration, it may be set aside.”

Published – 03 Jun 2026 12:53 IST