I was at Chetna Sharma’s home for our monthly beer sessions. Their two little girls, Saanya and Raina, came running to ask if I could take them to watch a game of quidditch. Chetna holds me responsible for their newfound obsession with the world of Harry Potter while Raina is the one who made me fall in love with dogs after the first time she and Tobler assumed their throne on my lap (Tobler uninvited!)

At the tender age of 1.5 years, Raina was found by the local police abandoned on the streets of Uttar Pradesh with a few bruises. Around the same time, the couple, who already had Saanya, had filed their application with the Central Adoption Resource Authority to adopt their second child. As destiny would have it, within 8 months, Raina found herself a loving family in the Sharmas.

As I poured another round, I told Chetna about how they have performed a noble deed by giving a new lease of life to an orphan, instead of producing ‘their own’. To my surprise, she emotively disagreed and said, “No Samyak, it is the other way around. With Raina coming into our lives, we have become so much more compassionate, open and emotionally intelligent. In fact, though she is still young, our decision has had a huge positive impact on Saanya as well. She understands now that love is unconditional.” This is one of the many stories of adoptive families that I have known.

By choosing to adopt, adoptive parents/families embark upon a journey of spiritual growth, contentment, and joy. Yet, in India, the general perception of adoption is quite the opposite. The narrative on adoption as an alternative to family planning either does not exist or is frowned upon in most households. Humans are inherently controlled by their need to reproduce and carry on their bloodlines. The story in India is no different. Yet, what makes the case of India different is the concept of caste. The fear of not being able to carry on their bloodline exists and adopting someone from a different caste may be an absolute no-go for many prospective families. Even if modern couples wish to adopt, the elders in the family may not accept a child out of adoption with concerns about them being from a lower caste or social strata. It is also true that one may be willing to adopt but may not possess the emotional bandwidth to do so. This, however, may be overcome by counselling and training. Moreover, the fear of legal and administrative delays also looms large upon those who wish to adopt and many a time stops them altogether from pursuing this option. While this fear may be somewhat justified due to India’s unyielding bureaucracy, it is important to reiterate that despite the potential hurdles in the process of adoption, it is worth it!

A person’s childhood holds significance in more ways than one can think. The compassion, care, and exposure with which a child is raised can determine the entire course of their lifetime. A child raised in the comforts of a loving home, will not only be able to create a good life for themselves but also contribute to the better good of society. A lack of emotional guidance, resources, and poor quality of education, on the other hand, may potentially create societal threats in the form of petty thieves, drug addicts, and criminals with little other recourse. For adoptive parents/families, adoption can help them evolve as individuals and perhaps even improve their mental health.

Adoptees say their documents are riddled with misinformation, fabrications

By Lee Hyo-jin

Peter Moller, 48, who was adopted to Denmark from South Korea in 1974, reached out to Korean adoption agency Holt International for the first time in 2011 to search for his roots.

Holt initially told the Danish adoptee that he was born in Seoul. But in subsequent letters, the adoption agency said he was actually born in Daejeon. Moller was then told that his biological mother gave birth to him in Nonsan, South Chungcheong Province on March 16, 1974, which happened to be the same day she brought him to the adoption agency in Seoul.

"How is this possible?" Moller thought. "What is the possibility that a woman who just gave birth to a child could travel across the country to give away the infant?"

An adopted man discovered his biological family after 20 years when his brother tracked him down on Instagram thanks to his unusual first name.

Iverson Poff, 20, was adopted from birth and raised by his adoptive parents—but always wondered who his biological family were.

Iverson, who grew up in Portland, Oregon had a few baby pictures provided by the adoption agency. However it was a closed adoption where adoptive family and the biological family have no contact, and the adoption agency used had long since shut its doors.

It was July 20th however, that he got an Instagram message from a man called Jalen Vickers; he said he was his older brother.

“I have that date tattooed on my arm, because it was so important to me,” said Poff. “I opened the message instantly and I knew straight away who it was. I just knew.”

Marie, born Kadiatou, was adopted in Mali in 1989 when she was only 19 months old. She grew up in France in a loving family, yet ignorant of her story and that of her biological parents.

Marie was 30 when her first daughter was born. The young mother feels ready to reconstruct the film of her life, hoping one day to be able to tell her daughter what she calls 'her great story'.

By consulting the file kept by her adoptive parents, she notices inconsistencies in aspects of her marital status that she took for granted. She then begins to ask herself questions about the conditions surrounding her adoption.

How old was she really? What is his date of birth ? Was she really born of an unknown father? What is his true birthplace? Under what circumstances was she entrusted to an adoptive family thousands of kilometers from Mali, her country of birth?

This quest for truth will lead Marie to take legal action against the Rayon de soleil association for foreign children (RSEE) and one of their correspondents. Eight other Malian adoptees also members of the Collective of French adoptees from Mali created by Marie participated in the legal action. The adoption organization specifies on its site "Between 1991 and 2001, we welcomed about 300 children for adoption" from Mali.

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rDwmrvPWLsjcAPy1apo_skF5MMYPCWaA/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=101922190264536777845&rtpof=true&sd=true

Rep. Kim Seong-joo "Child exports disguised as orphans... We need to find out the truth about overseas adoptions"

During the authoritarian government, 41.7% of overseas adoptees whose birth parents were unknown… 1.4 times higher than domestic adoption

Reporter Dae-Hong Kim (=Jeonbuk) | Article input 2022.10.03. 08:17:43

? Kim Seong-ju, a member of the Democratic Party of Korea. ?

Controversy has arisen over claims that serious human rights violations have been committed over overseas adoptions under the neglect of the authoritarian government in the past.?

The Flemish Center for Adoption (VCA) is currently working on a renewed system for (intercountry) adoption . This reform is commissioned by the Flemish Government following the final report of the expert panel on intercountry adoption that was published in September 2021.

The focus is on three 'recruitments':

1. strengthening partnerships with the countries of origin,

2. linking foster care and adoption,

3. focusing on aftercare and guidance during adoption.

In New York, a gay couple fighting to make their insurers pay for fertility treatment have found themselves in the middle of a culture war. What happens when the right to parenthood involves someone else’s body?

Corey Briskin and Nicholas Maggipinto met in law school in 2011, were engaged by 2014, and had their 2016 wedding announced in the New York Times. They moved to a waterfront apartment block in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with a bright playroom for families on the ground floor.

“We got married and then we wanted all the trappings: house, children, 401K [retirement saving plan], etc,” Maggipinto, 37, tells me in their building’s shared meeting room, tapping the table in sequence with the progression of each idea.

Briskin, 33, grew up assuming he’d have children. He came out in college. “Once I had come out to myself and others, I don’t think my expectation of what my life would look like changed all that much.” With marriage equality won years ago, they expected to be able to have a conventional married life.

Six months before their wedding, a targeted ad from an organisation called Gay Parents to Be landed in Maggipinto’s Instagram feed, offering free consultations with a fertility doctor who’d give them “the whole rundown” on how they could start a family. “We had the appointment and we were 100% on the same page – let’s move forward with this,” says Maggipinto.

Police said the two were traced and nabbed from Jalgaon and brought to Kaushmabi in Ghaziabad, where they admitted to the crime during sustained interrogation.

The Ghaziabad police on Thursday took into custody a 14-year-old girl, the adopted daughter of a 58-year-old man who was found murdered in their flat in Vaishali on September 22, and her 23-year-old friend from Jalgaon in Maharashtra, on charges of planning and executing the murder.

Police said the two were traced and nabbed from Jalgaon and brought to Kaushmabi in Ghaziabad, where they admitted to the crime during sustained interrogation.

The girl was legally adopted by the couple -- the deceased and his wife -- about a week after she was born 14 years ago, police said. She is currently a class 7 student at a private school in Vaishali and lived with her parents till the day of the murder on September 22. That evening, the CCTV cameras caught her leaving home with her schoolbag around 5pm, in the company of a young man.

Later in the evening, when her mother returned home from her office in Delhi, she found her husband dead, with his limbs tied up and mouth taped shut. The police, quoting the autopsy report, said the man was strangled to death with a rope.

An Indonesian man who had built a reputation as a savior of unwanted children has been arrested on suspicion of child trafficking.

Dubbed the “father of a million children,” the story of 32-year-old S moved many in the country after he took in 55 children under his care. The children were mostly born to women who conceived out of wedlock, who would have terminated their pregnancies or ditched their babies to escape social stigma.

On Wednesday, police in Bogor, West Java said they arrested S after uncovering a sinister plot behind his adoption of the 55 children.

“The culprit offered to help the pregnant women. After the children were born, [he would take them in but] they would eventually be given up for adoption. But the adoption process was illegal,” Bogor Police Chief Iman Imanuddin said, adding that S had faked documents to set up his organization, the Father of A Million Children Foundation.

“If somebody wanted to adopt one of his children, they would have to pay IDR15 million (US$985) to the culprit. The culprit used the Father of a Million Children Foundation as a front.”