The Bombay high court on Tuesday admitted for final hearing the petition filed challenging new guidelines on adoption.
The Bombay high court on Tuesday admitted for final hearing the petition filed challenging new guidelines on adoption. According to these guidelines, a potential parent could view photographs of children and reserve one after going through the child’s details. The petition has called this an ‘online baby shopping system.’
The division bench headed by Justice Abhay Oka admitted this petition for final hearing. The court was hearing two petition filed challenging the HC and Centre’s new guidelines.
One of the petitioners have contended that the online selection procedure contemplates selecting children merely on the basis of their appearance A child may be rejected merely because his photograph is not appealing enough. To protect the fundamental right to life of a child, it is essential that nobody should have a right to reject a child merely on the basis of appearance said that petitioner.
On the other hand Santosh Honkarape secretary of Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), a statutory body of the Ministry of Women and Child Development, filed an affidavit justifying new system and requested the court to dismiss the petition as “it devoid of merits.”
The affidavit claimed that the Adoption Committee of the Specialised Adoption Agencies (SAA), that facilitates adoptions, ultimately decides on matching a child with suitable Prospective Adoptive Parents (PAP). The affidavit further stated that the child is offered in pre-adoption foster care to the PAPs before a decision is taken on their application to adopt the child.
It also said that under new guidelines the PAPs are practically registered with all adoption agencies of that state rather than one particular agency. According to affidavit, “This procedure was adopted to address procedural flaws in the older guidelines (2011) which were in contrary to the best interest of the child. In early system of registration of PAPs with one agency, many children in agencies of far-flung districts were left languishing without getting adopted.” Mr Honkarape claimed, “Under the provisions of Guidelines 2015, children from all agencies, even from most remote places are referred for adoption to PAPs,” adding that besides, the new system enables stakeholders to know the current status of the adoption cases, which, “also ensures transparency.”
