HYDERABAD: The alleged rape of a minor girl at a city orphanage

recently, has brought to light the illegal mushrooming of child care

institutes (CCIs) across Telangana. According to officials of the women and

child welfare department (WCWD), there are over 200 such shelters up

and running in the state — most of them in Rangareddy and Medchal

A total of 3,531 children, including 2,061 girls, were adopted in India during the one year period ending March 31 with Maharashtra recording the highest number of adoptions among states, according to government data. As per data from the Child Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), 1,470 boys and 2,061 girls were adopted from April 1, 2019 to March 31, 2020.

In the context of widespread and generational preference for sons across cultures in the country, an official said people's mindset is slowly changing and they are becoming more accepting towards adopting girls. "We give them three choices - one can opt for a girl, a boy, or can give no preference (while applying for adopting a child). Many people prefer to adopt a girl child," he said. Activists, however, say more girls are adopted because more of them are available for adoption.

"Even a casual visit to an adoption agency will tell you there are far more girls than boys to select for adoption. So to attribute it to progressive values may be a bit exaggerated or over-simplistic," said Akhila Sivadas, executive director at the Centre for Advocacy and Research, a non-profit organisation. She said many families have a strong preference for sons and go to the extent of taking recourse to pre-natal sex determination and selection to abort the female foetus, with some even abandoning the girl child. "There is a sense of collective wrong and guilt among some people who genuinely strive to redress it by adopting girls," she said.

According to the data, 3,120 children were adopted in the age group of 0-5 years while in the age group of 5-18 years as many as 411 children were adopted between April last year and March this year. The official said adoption of older children continues to be an issue as most parents still prefer to adopt children below two years of age. "People prefer to adopt younger children due to which it becomes more and more difficult to get a child adopted as he or she grows up," he said. Sivadas said people might prefer younger children to experience the joy of parenting a child from the time it is born or soon after it is born.

"However, we must recognize that adoption is not always done with the altruistic motive of giving the child a better life. As a result children with any kind of challenges including inter-sex children are rarely adopted," she said. She further said "to what extent all this is reflecting changing values is yet to be established and only an in-depth study can resolve this matter with some degree of certainty and authority". Within the country, 3,110 children were adopted while 421 inter-country adoptions took place in 2019-20, according to the data.

(Jamaica Star) Marlon* says he has been restless since September when he discovered that his eight-year-old daughter was given up for adoption overseas without his consent.

The fuming father said he is seeking assistance from the relevant authorities to reverse the procedure.

“I can’t sleep at nights. I don’t know if my child is happy. I need to speak to my child. I would do anything to reverse the adoption. I am all about a better life for my child but do it the right way. Mi never did have to find out from others say mi daughter get adopted because no loving father would feel good,” he said. “I want to have access to my child and I don’t want her to have another person’s last name.”

Marlon said although he and his babymother, Faith*, parted ways when she was pregnant, he is adamant that he was very involved in his daughter’s life. But he admitted that his name is not on the birth certificate.

“I was at work when my baby was born and when I went to the hospital the following morning, her mother was not answering her phone,” he said.

Trichy: The Trichy district administration on Thursday released the picture of an abandoned female baby to enable the parents

to claim her.

The baby was abandoned at the bus shelter in Kadiyakurichi in Jeeyarpuram on the ourtskirts of the city around 6am on June

10. Locals rescued the infant and handed her over to the Jeeyapuram police. Later, the baby was brought to the Mahatma

Gandhi memorial government hospital (MGMGH) by Sevai Child line officials.

Hyderabad: A two-judge panel of the Telangana High Court, comprising Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice B Vijaysen Reddy, on Thursday adjourned a habeas corpus petition filed by M Kavitha Reddy seeking directions to produce her daughter before the court.

The counsel appearing for the petitioner complained that her daughter was taken away by the Child Welfare Committee on the grounds that the adoption was illegal. He pointed out that no orders were passed by the Child Welfare Committee but with the aid of the police, the petitioner’s daughter was taken away.

He submitted to the court that the biological mother of the minor had abandoned her when the child was 2 months old and her present address was not known. The father of the minor daughter had expired in an accident. The child was with the paternal grandparents and that they had given her in adoption to the petitioner who was a distant relative of the child. The panel directed the petitioner to implead the grandparents and confirm the authenticity of the adoption deed. Court posted the case to next week.

State police functioning irks panel

The same panel came down heavily on the state on the functioning of the State police in giving instructions to public prosecutors. It directed the Advocate General to examine the same and issue necessary instructions to the public prosecutors. The panel was dealing with a habeas corpus case filed by Pagidi Ravi who sought the release of Pagidi Sashi who was detained under the Preventive Detention Act.

From humble beginnings but through commitment and perseverance of a group of people, the Place of Restoration Trust was born in 1992. Just as a little seed is planted in the ground by the farmer, there was great expectancy that it should grow and prosper .With a dream and a seed of R20.00 given to Basil and Monica Woodhouse as the founders, the organisation has become a BIG TREE and is still growing! Inspired by the scripture in James 1:27 ”Pure Religion in the eyes of the Lord is to care for the orphans and widows”, this still guides the organisation up to present times.The journey has been exciting ....

In 1992 “The Place of Restoration Trust” was registered with 4 Trustees , with the Master of the Supreme Court. (NO – 5570-92), the Department of Social Development as a Shelter and as a Non Profit Organization with the NPO Directorate (004-524 NPO).From 1993 to 1996, the plot that was purchased in Margate was developed to accommodate the Woodhouse family and the 27 women and children who had been staying in Port Shepstone. In September 1996 everyone moved from Port Shepstone to the new home of The Place of Restoration.The years 1997 to 2001 focused on the development of organisational structures, holistic programs for children and capacity building of staff.

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In August, US imposed sanctions against High Court Judge Wilson Masalu Musene and a retired judge, Moses Mukiibi on allegations of illegal child adoption.

2 judges under probe over child adoption

Masalu, the Resident Judge of Soroti High Court, earlier last month denied the allegations. He said the sanctions and visa restrictions are malicious and unfair.

CHILD ADOPTION|JUDGES|COURT|CRIME

Two High Court judges are being investigated by the Judicial Service Commission over allegations of irregular child adoption.

The appeals court in the Persian Gulf port of Bushehr has ruled that a Christian couple must give up custody of their adopted two-year-old daughter.

Maryam Fallahi and Sam Khosravi, an Iranian Christian couple, adopted a girl by the name of Lydia when she was 10 weeks old. The court’s verdict stated that a Christian family cannot have custody of Lydia because she was born to a Muslim mother.

This two-year-old child suffers from heart and digestive ailments and Iran’s Welfare Organization had not informed the couple of her condition before they adopted her. Nevertheless, both the Welfare Organization and the Medical Examiner confirmed that, throughout their custody, the couple gave Lydia the best care possible. The judge in his ruling conceded that the chances of another family adopting Lydia “is zero.”

“The verdict by the judge to separate Lydia from this Christian couple completely contradicts fatwas by [grand ayatollahs] Makarem Shirazi and Yousef Saanei, two Shia religious authorities,” said the couple’s lawyer. In response to the lawyers query, Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi had ruled that because of “necessity” the child can remain with the couple. And Ayatollah Saanei’s fatwa stated that, under Sharia law, there is no problem with the couple retaining custody of Lydia.

Maryam Fallahi and Sam Khosravi were among seven Christian converts who were arrested in the summer of 2019 by security forces in Bushehr, tried by a Revolutionary Court in June of this year, and later sentenced to prison, exile, a fine, and a ban on work and social activities. Sam Khosravi was sentenced to one year in prison and two years of exile from Bushehr while Maryam Fallahi was fined 80 million rials ($2,000) and was banned from government service for life.

Pune: State woman and child development (WCD) minister Yashomati Thakur has said that all care and precautions had been

taken to prevent the spread of coronavirus at the 362 childcare protection homes in the state.

With the rising number of Covid-19 cases in the state, a detailed plan had been drawn up by the WCD department for taking

care of children at these homes.

There are currently 10,000 children at shelter homes across the state. Before the pandemic, there were 21,000 children. The

IN MARCH, AN orphanage on the outskirts of Hyderabad in Ameenpur asked a teenage girl, who alleged she was raped, to leave the institution following the lockdown. Police said that the 14-year-old, whose parents had died years ago, may have been subject to repeated sexual abuse at the orphanage. Finally, she was forced to return to her relatives who had put her in the orphanage in 2015. Shortly, while at her relatives’ home, she had to be admitted to a hospital due to the injuries she had sustained from repeated rapes. The girl died in a government hospital last month, bringing to the focus, yet again, multiple jeopardies children face in orphanages in India, especially when relatives and even their parents are too uncaring to pay a visit even after years.

All this is an outcome, avers Pune-based child-rights activist Smriti Gupta, of our officials not “defining the word ‘caring’ by family” of children forced to live in government-run or privately operated childcare centres, also called shelters and orphanages. The inadequate definition of ‘caring’ means that children are not freed from the clutches of their indifferent parents and not placed for adoption. While it is true that poor parents, especially migrant workers, do place their children in shelters and maintain warm ties with them, Gupta rues the policy of prioritising parents and not the kids.

Gupta is the CEO of the meaningfully titled charity organisation ‘Where Are India’s Children?’ Her argument is that the mindset of lawmakers and officials is to focus on what parents want, notwithstanding their dubious record as uncaring ones. Her organisation’s title verbalises her own vision and purpose. “I had made up my mind as a student that I would not have children of my own, but would adopt them. I didn’t want to marry either, but then when I was doing my master’s in electrical engineering, I met my husband and Cupid struck. I told him we would adopt children, and he readily agreed,” says this former US-based employee of Wikimedia Foundation, the parent company of Wikipedia. Both her children are adopted. It was when she decided to adopt the second one, after the first one turned three, that she realised it was not a cumbersome process, mostly because new rules stipulated that prospective parents would be allotted options by the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), a statutory body that falls under the Ministry of Women and Child Development.

Yet, in the CARA pool, there were very few children compared with those living in childcare institutions. So, while many parents want to adopt, there are very few children available. That was the trigger for Gupta to launch her NGO to help identify more children who needed to get adopted and live with normal families. “The Hyderabad girl should have been in the adoption pool,” she says with a whiff of regret.

Over 30,000 parents in India are waiting to adopt while the ‘pool’ has barely 2,000 children. According to the Government, the CARA, which maintains this pool, functions as the nodal body for adoption of Indian children and is mandated to monitor and regulate intra-country and inter-country adoptions. Its website says, ‘CARA is designated as the Central Authority to deal with inter-country adoptions in accordance with the provisions of the Hague Convention on Inter-country Adoption, 1993, ratified by the government of India in 2003.’ The new rules came into force in 2013.