Biopolitical Excess: Techno-Legal Assemblage of Stem Cell Research in India

Abstract

Stem cell research on cardiac patients at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), which was disclosed through the media in 2005, created a storm. On the one hand, it was celebrated as a ‘global first in pioneering stem cell medicine’. On the other hand, not only the AIIMS study, but, more broadly, stem cell research and therapy in India was criticised for ‘tall claims [and] questionable ethics’. The responses of the policymakers and regulators in India were equally divergent. How are we to understand the contingency and unpredictability of the regulatory regime in India? The answers to this and other related questions are often presented through a regulatory fix—countries such as India need to tighten their regulatory regime. The need for a legally binding regulatory regime is undeniable; nevertheless, a narrow focus on a regulatory fix fails to explain several issues. In this article, I analyse the stem cell research on cardiac patients at AIIMS. Through a focus on epistemic, ethical and juridical assemblage of stem cell research, I highlight the inescapable contingency in the translation between ‘governmental rationality’ and ‘the practice of government’ and show how this reflects biopolitical excess.