Gurgaon: In a step to make the process of adoption of children hassle-free and to end the ambiguity around the process, the district administration on Sunday announced that a new state-backed adoption agency will come up at the Old Age Home in Sector 4. The centre will be inaugurated by the vice-chairperson of the state child welfare council, Parisha Sharma, Monday.

“There are many orphaned kids in the city, but the process of adoption of such kids involves a lot of legal aspects and that’s where this agency will be of help. It will assist childless couples adopt orphan kids and raise them responsibly,” said deputy commissioner Yash Garg.

“The Central government has constituted Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) to adopt a child. Any couple in the district will be able to adopt children following the rules laid down by this adoption agency,” he added.

“Online applications can be made on the official website of CARA. Besides this, there are some conditions for the adopting couple to satisfy, as well. It is necessary for the couple to be physically, mentally, emotionally, and financially capable,” Garg added.

A single woman can adopt a child of any gender while a single man can only adopt a boy.

Scottish mothers who endured the forced adoption of their babies have said an national apology for their losses was “not enough” and called for deep reforms to allow them to heal from the “atrocity” of being separated from their children.

The Movement for Adoption Apology in Scotland has stressed calls for much-needed mental health support for mothers and changes to the management of adoption records, which remain closed for 100 years to parents.

The campaign has also called for a permanent memorial to those affected, with adoption often presented as the only option, both by many families and health professionals, given social attitudes of the day towards unmarried mothers. Many women have spoken of a lifetime of shame, trauma and secrets that followed.

It is estimated around 60,000 women in Scotland were affected by such adoptions, with the period between the 1950s and early 1980s now in sharp focus.

Jeannot Farmer, 65, of MAA Scotland, spoke out as the Scottish Government announced it would start collecting experiences of women with a view to establishing support and action required.

A 31-year-old woman accused of leaving her baby in an underground waste container in Amsterdam-Slotermeer in 2014 should be convicted and sent to a prison cell for four years, the Public Prosecution Service (OM) said in court on Thursday. The prosecutor said that Todisoa R. deliberately tried to kill her one-month old daughter when the child was abandoned in an underground dumpster.

On Sunday, 26 October 2014, the child was found around 4:15 a.m. by a passerby who heard crying noises coming from within the waste bin on Fritz Conijnstraat. The police and fire brigade together managed to rescue the baby girl.

Nothing was known about the child’s birth parents, or how she ended up in the garbage, until nearly seven years later. During that time, she was adopted into another family. The police identified the mother, R., thanks to a fingerprint left on the bag in which the baby was found in 2014. Last May, Germany extradited the woman to the Netherlands.

Her attorney said that the R has an intellectual disability. Originally from Madagascar, R. moved to the Netherlands as an undocumented immigrant in 2014. She denied leaving her child in the dumpster later that year. She alleged an alternative scenario claiming that the father absconded with the child while R. was sleeping, and then came back to say that the girl was dead.

R said in court that she, "didn't throw Nomena in the trash." When explaining further, she added, "But I didn't do it. I did not do it. I only want a future for my children.” Her attorney said that there was not enough evidence to convict her and called for an acquittal.

The LGBTQ+ rights group COC Netherlands wants Minister for Legal Protection Franc Weerwind to present a multi-parent law this year. The group advocated the law in a letter to the new minister on behalf of itself and four other organizations.

The multi-parent law would make it possible for children to have several legal parents––not just a maximum of two, as is currently the case. This law is part of COC Netherland's Rainbow Agreement, which the new Cabinet wants to incorporate into the coalition agreement.

"Children have the right to a good legal relationship with all their parents, whether there are one, two, three, or four," said COC Nederland chairperson Astrid Oosenbrug. "There is a wonderful opportunity for Minister Weerwind to arrange this quickly and we will be happy to help him with that," Oosenbrug said.

The letter also asked that every Dutch person be able to easily change the gender registration in their passport to an “X” instead of “M” or “F.” This option could be, for example, used by nonbinary people and those who do not want their gender included in their passport. Lisa van Ginneken from the D66 party recently submitted a proposal about this.

The interest groups represented in the letter also requested good surrogacy regulations and improvements on gender registration laws. In addition, the organizations propose to make intercountry adoption possible again from countries where no problems regarding adoption have been identified. The government stopped intercountry adoption in February 2021 due to severe abuses in several countries.

The couple has named their youngest daughter Naina Hope Mylius.

It is said that not all families are based on blood relations. Nothing embodies this more than Johonna Jo Mylius and her husband Shane Michael Mylius. The Texas couple faced lengthy paperwork, visa issues, and pandemic restrictions for more than two years to finish their daughter’s adoption process.

The Mylius’s wanted to adopt a second child after the birth of their daughter Kaila. Their search brought them to India where they matched with Naina in October 2019 when she was just 18 months old. Naina was a premature baby and was hearing-impaired. She was abandoned in a newborn intensive care unit. However, her medical complications did not stop Mylius from going ahead with the adoption.

They were set to obtain Naina’s custody in March 2020 but then the whole world went under a lockdown due to Covid-19 and all operations were put on hold. After anxiously waiting for many months, they got Naina’s custody in December 2020 and were set to travel to India in February 2021 to receive their daughter.

Unfortunately, a week before they were set to leave for India, it snowed too much in Texas that put all operations at a halt. The couple was yet to receive their visa from the Indian consulate. Explaining the precarious situation, Johonna Mylius wrote in an essay published on Love What Matters, “We were set to fly out of Houston on Wednesday. Saturday and Sunday, it snowed and no mail was delivered. Monday was President’s Day so, no mail was running. Tuesday, roads still icy, we were out of electricity at home, phone lines were down, and the Indian consulate wasn’t answering.”

Poverty had forced her mother to give Amuthavalli for adoption when she was just eleven days old. Now 23, Amuthavalli learned about her past recently and came down from the Netherlands to meet them.

SALEM: Tears of joy rolled down the cheeks of Amuthavalli on Thursday when she met her mother for the first time. Poverty had forced her mother to give Amuthavalli for adoption when she was just eleven days old. Now 23, Amuthavalli learned about her past recently and came down from the Netherlands to meet them.

Amuthavalli is the second child of R Amutha and Ranganathan, a resident of Dasasamuthram near Kadaiyampatti. Her elder sister Jeniffer is 25 years old.

Since Ranganathan was addicted to liquor which added to the family's financial woes, Amutha gave Amuthavalli to a missionary in Salem, in 1998, for adoption when she was eleven days old. A couple from the Netherlands adopted Amuthavalli and took her there. She completed schooling and is running a flower boutique. Recently she came to know about her past and expressed her wish to meet the biological parents. Her adopted parents gave consent, and Amuthavalli landed in Chennai on Tuesday.

Accompanied by a guide (she knows only Dutch language), she travelled to Salem and collected details of her parents from the missionary. She went to Dharmapuri and was told that her father Ranganathan died long ago and that her mother Amutha was staying at Dasasamuthram in Salem.

A girl child is not property that can be donated, the Bombay High Court (Aurangabad

Bench) observed during a bail hearing after it noticed a 'danpatra' according to which the

rape victim's father had allegedly donated her to a self-proclaimed godman.

Justice Vibha Kankanwadi directed the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) to ascertain if

the teen was fit to be declared as a 'child in need of care and protection' as contemplated

In Flanders, 46 children were adopted last year, 27 of which were through so-called intercountry adoption. This is apparent from figures that Belga has requested from Kind en Gezin.

While nearly 30 children were adopted through domestic adoption in 2017, that number has fallen below 20 in recent years. Last year, nineteen children, including twins, were placed with eighteen adopters.

In 2021, 27 children were also placed with a family in Flanders through the mediation of an intercountry adoption service. It concerns children from nine countries of origin: the Philippines, Thailand, Chile, South Africa, Hungary, Portugal, Togo, Burkina Faso and Morocco.

The number of foreign adoptions has also been affected by the corona pandemic in recent years. For example, no air traffic was possible with a number of countries of origin and the adoption could not always be legally confirmed, because some foreign courts were closed, so that the actual adoption had to be postponed.

Future screening

COC Netherlands wants Minister Franc Weerwind (Legal Protection) to present a multi-parent law this year. The interest group of the LGBTI community advocates this in a letter to the new minister, also on behalf of four other organizations.

The multi-parent law should ensure that children can have several legal parents and not a maximum of two, as is currently the case. This law is part of COC's Rainbow Agreement, which the new cabinet intends to implement in accordance with the coalition agreement.

"Children have the right to a good legal relationship with all their parents, whether there are one, two, three or four," says COC chairman Astrid Oosenbrug. "There is a wonderful opportunity for Minister Weerwind to arrange this quickly and we will be happy to help him with that."

Gender Registration

COC Netherlands also argues in the letter to Weerwind that every Dutch person should be able to easily change the gender registration in the passport to an 'X' instead of 'M' or 'V'. This is for people who, for example, do not feel like a man or woman or who do not want their gender to be included in their passport. D66 MP Lisa van Ginneken recently submitted a proposal on this point.

A desperate need to know her roots led a young woman from Netherlands to fly down to a nondescript village in Salem.

Coimbatore: What happened next was nothing short of a fairytale. The visit to Poosaripatti village in Kadayampatti Taluk in Salem district turned out to be life-changing for 23-year-old Amada (Amudhavalli), who, found her biological mother, who incidentally shares the same name as her daughter.

The circumstances behind her adoption tale were revealed to Amudha after the emotional reunion. Her poverty-stricken mother had to give her away when she was just 11 days old, in the care of a missionary in Salem in August 1998. Soon after, the baby was adopted by a couple from Netherland.

“It was the most painful decision of my life and one that I regretted throughout. I was constantly haunted by her memories,” the mother said. She works as a domestic help. She had to resort to the extreme step and give away her second girl child after her drunkard husband deserted the family.

The young Amudha, who grew up as a citizen of Netherland, was often plagued by identity crisis in a family of white people, and this triggered her need to look for her biological parents. “I only knew the name of my parents and my birth place through my foster parents. Determined to meet them, I came down to Chennai all alone from Netherland. With the assistance of a guide, I gathered information from Salem Government Hospital and managed to track down my family. It was difficult. But I am glad to have met them at last and am basking in love. It has been a dream come true moment,” said Amada, who runs a bouquet shop in Netherland.