District Judge Girish Kathpalia said it would be in the best interest of the child that she be given in adoption to the woman, who has been taking care of her for more than a decade as her appointed guardian.

EW DELHI: A minor, who was abandoned by her parents in 2004 at the age of two, has seen a ray of hope as a Delhi court has allowed her 60-year-old guardian to adopt the child despite "procedural deficiencies" as the two nurtured a strong mother-daughter bond.

District Judge Girish Kathpalia said it would be in the best interest of the child that she be given in adoption to the woman, who has been taking care of her for more than a decade as her appointed guardian.

The strong bond shared by the girl, now 16, and the woman who was made her guardian by an adoption society, which was taking care of the child, convinced the court to allow the elderly's plea for adoption.

The court noted that since the woman and the child have cultivated and nurtured a strong mother-daughter bond for about a decade and a half, directing her now to move the adoption application before the society, followed by the home and child study report, would be a "meaningless exercise".

The case against a former Ottawa aid worker, accused of victimizing several Nepalese boys, is the latest black mark for the international aid community, which has seen several organizations roiled by allegations of workers committing sex crimes against children.

Paul McCarthy, 62, was granted bail Wednesday, on a condition of house arrest, after he was charged last week with multiple child pornography offences and one count of luring a child.

McCarthy was stopped by the Canada Border Services Agency in mid-December as he returned home following a volunteer mission to an orphanage in Nepal.

Authorities said the investigation led to the identification of five alleged victims: all Nepalese boys under the age of 16.

In the 1990s, McCarthy worked for disaster relief organization CARE Canada where he was director for Indonesia between 1992 and 1995.

Centre issued model guidelines on foster care in 2016, Foster Care, Foster Care Homes, Foster Care Rules notified in 2014 under the state Juvenile Justice (JJ) Act, 2000 and the JJ Rules, 2011, Indian Express Sunday Special

When she joined the family, Lilliput was a quiet child, guarded, even a bit stubborn, often picking up fights with the domestic help, and scared of the family dog Scooby. (Express Photo by Mahim Pratap Singh)

It’s a relaxed Saturday morning for nine-year-old Lilliput. It’s an off day at school, the usually harsh Rajasthan sun is calm behind an overcast sky, and the grey Aravalis that surround her home are a lush green from the first monsoon showers. “Cycle chalana sabse achcha lagta hai (I love cycling the most),” she says, pedalling down the street outside her foster home at Chitrakoot Nagar on the outskirts of Udaipur, the city of lakes.

“Uff, iski chain nikal gayi (the cycle chain has come off),” she says softly, her smile now turned upside down, much like the sad emoji, as she drags the small bike with support wheels inside the house. Lilliput, as her new family calls her affectionately, is one of the first children to be taken into foster care after the Centre issued model guidelines on foster care in 2016.

In 2008, the police had found her in Chittorgarh. An unclaimed child born to a victim of sexual assault, she was barely a month old then. She spent nine years in a care home, before being recently brought in by a 52-year-old Air-India duty manager and her 11-year-old daughter, into their home.

Legal issues must not derail whistleblower protection law

MEPs and activists reacted with dismay, at today’s Greens and S&D ‘Protecting EU Whistleblowers: A Race Against Time’ conference, to the suggestion that the opinion of the Council’s legal services, on the whistleblowers protection file, could delay or even derail the proposed legislation.

By: Martin ToddJanuary 9, 2019News

WBP Conf Jan 9 2019

Whistleblower protection before European elections?

State to repay clients of failed overseas adoption agency

Seventy people who sought to adopt children through Arc Adoption owed €2,750

Wed, Jan 9, 2019, 19:29

Jennifer Bray

Minister for Children Katherine Zappone announced in 2016 that Arc Adoption had run into cash flow problems. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw.

Verein is planning new projects for Romania

The Romania working group is planning new projects in Transylvania for 2019 - the construction of five family houses for orphans will now be followed by circus performances and the refurbishment of the afternoon school.

Ehlershausen / Hemmingen

Right now is a quarter of a century of intensive work for the project "A House for Tomorrow" behind Wolfgang Gerth from Ehlershausen and Günther Heinken from Hemmingen - as the assets of the Association Romania Working Group Hemmingen (RAGH) are already planning new projects. "We have already achieved a lot, but there is still a lot of work to do", Heinken summarizes the experience of the past 25 years.

The initiative for the project around the town Christuru Seculesc (Keresztur) was given at the beginning of the nineties by a visit of Wolfgang Gerts and his second wife Martina, who wanted to give a new home to Romanian orphans with an adoption. "The conditions in the home that we visited had shaken us," recalls the Ehlershausener. He tells of up to 30 children, some of whom had to sleep in triple beds in a hall, from darkened rooms, where boys and girls between the ages of three and 18 spent their days in bed, from lack of perspective.

WCD notice to adoption home where 2 infants died

At Bal Anand adoption home in Chembur. (Express: Pradip Das)

Food poisoning or milk adulteration may not have caused illnesses in children at the Bal Anand World Children Welfare orphanage, reveals a preliminary inquiry by Food and Drug Administration(FDA) into the death of two infants and hospitalisation of four others from the adoption home.

FDA officials collected 15 samples of dal, rice, milk, and other raw materials used for cooking at the Chembur-based adoption home on December 26, the day five-month-old orphan Khushi died in Zen hospital.

The next day, nine-month-old Jaydeep died in Kohinoor hospital. Four others, aged less than a year and a half, were hospitalised. Three of them required intensive care support.

Girls at the Muzaffarpur shelter home in Bihar were drugged and raped in their sleep. Muzaffarpur shelter home owner Brajesh Thakur, along with the help of the shelter home's staff, routinely exploited and abused the girls. This and much more was revealed by the Central Bureau of Investigation in its Muzaffarpur shelter home rape case chargesheet

India Today Web Desk

Patna

January 7, 2019UPDATED: January 7, 2019 18:24 IST

Muzaffarpur shelter home rape case: CBI chargesheet reveals how girls were drugged, raped, murdered

From Denmark to Coimbatore: It’s return of the native

By: PTI | Published: January 5, 2019 8:22 PM

A 43-year-old man, who was adopted by a Danish-couple some 40 years ago, has come here in search of his roots and biological parents.

Rajakumar, born to Ayyavu in 1975 and a resident of Thondamuthu near here, was handed over to the Blue Mountain Childrens’ Home and later adopted by the Danish couple when he was 18 months old.

A 43-year-old man, who was adopted by a Danish-couple some 40 years ago, has come here in search of his roots and biological parents. Rajakumar, born to Ayyavu in 1975 and a resident of Thondamuthu near here, was handed over to the Blue Mountain Childrens’ Home and later adopted by the Danish couple when he was 18 months old.

Bhopal: The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has taken cognizance of inter state child trafficking racket case that was busted a few months ago in Alirajpur. In its letter, the commission has stated that the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information regarding a multi- state child sale racket from its partner organization, Aawaj, working in Madhya Pradesh for child rights.

Travesty of justice

Aawaj members played a crucial role in uncovering the racket by acting as decoy customers while working with the police. In a strange twist however, authorities then handed over the sold children for foster care back to the same families who had bought them in the name of good bonding. The AHRC strongly condemned such an ill thought decision and demanded proper foster care for the children.

It said an effective and timely investigation into the case must also be undertaken and those found guilty must be prosecuted.

By now, the police have arrested a total 28 persons, including one doctor, four hospital staff and some of the male customers. Yet, in a strange twist and travesty of justice afterwards, the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) of District Alirajpur, the nodal agency for the protection and welfare of children handed over many of the children to the very same families that have bought them.