Marriages end. Romantic love fades—or at least waxes and wanes. But the first time you hold your child in your arms, you know that you are now joined as one, parent and child, for as long as you live. And, even if that relationship ever grows toxic or estranged, parent and child, you shall remain forever.

For my partner and I, and our family, that moment of no return came when our daughter was over a year old. And how she came into our lives became irrelevant as quickly as we fell irrevocably and madly in love with our ever-fascinating child. Five years on, our lives revolve around screentime limits, non-stop questions, the squishiest hugs, the wisest obse­rvations, the funniest jokes, and incessant eye-rolls from the resident six-going-on-sixteen little person in our lives. Meanwhile, the paperwork, the long wait, and the judge pronouncing the order that joined us as a family forever are only distant memories.

But over these five years, I’ve had several prospective adoptive parents reach out to me with questions, worries, and doubts. Will I love this child as I would my ‘own’? What will I do if people I love discriminate against her? How will I tell him he was adopted? Why should I tell her she was adopted? When should I tell them? And, how do I stop my heart from breaking when I gather the courage to tell them? The ans­wers are simple and start from a singular truth. You are parent and child. Forever.

Unconditionally Forever I don’t have an adoptedchild. Instead, my child came into my life through adoption. And adoption doesn’t have to be a scary word. It doesn’t matter what led you to become a parent: great sex, a petri-dish in a laboratory, or truckloads of paperwork. All that matters are the bright eyes that light up your life. And so, adoption was just the process. It is also an essential part of your child’s history, which they have the absolute right to know. Tell them, be honest, use age-appropriate stories, meet other families made from adoption. But it’s unquestionably the right thing to do.

I talk about adoption to everyone who asks, looks curious, or gives me the slightest opening. I’m an over-sharer, and my Facebook timeline is filled with unt­hought-through posts with #TMI. And thus, I open myself up to comments and questions that range from how ‘noble’ we are, how ‘lucky’ she is, and whether we know who our daughter’s ‘real parents’ are. I try to answer each question logically, unemotionally, factually—because often, people really don’t know any better. And I’d like to do my bit to hopefully open someone’s mind enough to have some child somewhere find their way to their forever family.

Amidst the dark pandemic, a bright side has been the morphing of the templated ‘events’

weddings and ‘milestone’ celebrations into smaller, more intimate ceremonies. At a recent one

such close and connected gathering, marking the birth of a baby girl, conversations about

different ways a family is made—for this one had chosen surrogacy—soon segued into a deeper

discussion.

When educationist Geet Oberoi decided to adopt her first child, Indya, 14 years ago, procedural

delays were the first stumbling block. She was single and had to wait for three years before she

could adopt a child. In 2010, Priya Ramanathan, also single, ran into the same wall. She wanted

to adopt a seven-month-old baby, but was told that it would take more than two years as single

parents were not the preferred choice. Many agencies wouldn’t even accept applications from

Some couples avoid the sacred act of adoption, because in their minds, this equals a tacit admission—we can’t procreate on our own.

It was a cruel joke, and some kin would always poke and jest, saying, “You were adopted.” I did not know the meaning of the phrase or the procedure, and yet an insect would fly in my heart as if, I compreh­ended, it meant severance from my family tree, being a pariah in the foggy plateau of patriar­c­hy­. I must have understood that those words were aimed to make me bleed the wrong blood. Why would one crack that joke with a three-year-old, unless the general accord considered child-adoption as taboo, and that a child subje­c­ted to adoption belonging to a caste outside all those castes they had created?

So I vowed to adopt a child myself, whenever I would have my own family. It was the 1980s. Guess how mainstream middle-class society chose to ignore the sparkles an adopted child might bring to a certain gene pool!

The history of famous personalities who were adopted, and who went ahead to make the name of their adopted family shine, passed through the minds of the mass who registered the narrations, respected and disregarded en masse.

Near my youth’s end, I met my wife. She nur­s­­ed similar ambitions originating from similar impu­lses. By that time, adoption—of a child, a tree or a tiger in the zoo—was already in vogue. We deci­d­ed that our first child would be adop­t­ed, and then, near the sunset of our biological efficacy, we should try to birth one song toget­h­er. The idea was a roadkill on its way to realisation.

For an increasing number of couples in India, having a child is no longer as alluring as it once used to be. With “career first” becoming the new norm for young and middle-aged couples, the status of motherhood has seen a drastic fall across India. The recently released Census Report (2016) on the fertility status of India indicates declining fertility among Indian women, with an alarming decline of 31 per cent recorded for the period 1991 to 2016.

More and more women in India are failing to conceive naturally and need assisted reproductive methods to bear children, say medical practitioners. The rural-urban differential has also narrowed down, indicates the census. Birth rates have declined in Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Odisha, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Uttarakhand and Telangana. While Bihar has the highest birth rate among rural areas in the country, Uttar Pradesh holds the title for urban areas. The lowest birth rate has been recorded in rural areas of Kerala and urban areas of Himachal Pradesh.

Interestingly, the decline in fertility rates is more in rural areas across India, except in the age group of 20-24 years. During the last decade, fertility declined in the older age groups (above 24 years) in rural areas, but rose in the same age group in urban areas. There has also been a decline in marital fertility in women aged 30 years and above, both in rural and urban areas.

Demographers are surprised that even in states like West Bengal and Telangana, which have high rates of early marriages, there is a sharp decline in fertility rates among women.

Though education and environment are imp­ortant factors governing the fertility indicator, doctors opine that reasons vary for urban and rural areas across the country.

Adoption Is Also Like Giving Birth. There Is No ‘Getting’ To Like It. You Always Wanted It. You Alw­ays Wanted A Child. You Always Knew.

My husband and I had, at the time of our marriage, agreed to have a biological child and adopt a second one. As life would have it, I had a miscarriage and was told that conceiving naturally would be a challenge. An IVF treatment was the only alternative. Our decision to apply for adoption was instantaneous.

Adopting a child no longer means a walk-in to an orphanage. We got ourselves registered in CARA (Central Adoption Resource Authority) and our wait for a referral started. Our choice was ‘any gender’, ‘anywhere in the country’. We figured that just as we wouldn’t have a choice of gender if we were to conceive a biological child, we’d go for the option of any gender. Let life determine.

A wait of two years and a little over, Reuben was referred to us through Caritas Goa. We scanned the paperwork, and what caught my att­ention the most amidst the vaccination record, blood work, developmental yardsticks , etc., was the mention that Reuben has the most beautiful smile.

It is said that your face changes, but your smile remains the same. Reuben came into our lives with that smile. There were a few lines about his birth mother and when I see Reuben’s robust ene­rgy, I know it is his mother’s genes at work.

Lost in a mela or left in the train? Indian cinema has reprised the same old story in different settings.

Flipping through the pages of Gulshan Nanda, Ved Prakash Sharma and Su­r­­e­ndra Mohan Pathak to pilfer ‘ins­p­iration’ for their pulp movies has been a hoary pastime of Bollywood filmmakers. At times, however, they turn surreptitiously to Vic­torian literature as well. And Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights appears to be a perennial favourite.

From Dilip Kumar’s Dil Diya Dard Liya (1966) to Rajesh Khanna’s Oonche Log (1985), Hindi movies have borrowed, nay stolen, its plot revolving around Heathcliff, an orphan who falls in love with the daughter of the man who brings him home. Good for Ms. Bronte that she did not live long to see what Mumbai’s movie moguls did to her all-time classic or, for that matter, to her famous anti-hero.

As a matter of fact, an orphan as the central character has captured the fancy of the Indian dream merchants since the very beginni­ng. But in no era was it more pro­nounced than the hea­dy 1970s when movies based on the lost-and­-­found formula reached the peak of popularity and bestowed greatness on the likes of Manmo­han Desai and Prakash Mehra.

Separated from his family under quirky circu­mstances imagined by ingenuous screenwriters of the time, an orphan on screen was often the quintessential hero in several potboilers. He not only loved to release his pent-up angst at the sli­ghtest provocation against the zaalim duniya (cru­el world) but also considered mohabbat (love) to be a sheer waste of time.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Family Court has strongly criticized the Child Welfare Committee regarding the illegal adoption of Anupama's child. The

noted that clear details of the adoption license are not provided. The court's sharp criticism came when the committee asked for more time to submit

report on the matter. The court also directed the committee to produce the original license immediately. The case was adjourned for a detailed hearin

The Child Welfare Committee responded to the court's criticism that an application had been made to extend the license and that the investigation is

final stages. The Child Welfare Committee asked the court to give it till the 30th of this month to complete the investigation.

Anupama and her husband Ajith come out of the CWC office at Poojapura on Thursday

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Kerala state council for child welfare on Thursday issued an order for facilitating the DNA test of the child it had given out for adoption to an Andhra couple.

The order was issued after Anupama, who has accused her parents of giving out her baby for adoption to the council without her consent, claimed that the child was hers. After the government informed the court about the claims of Anupama over the child, the court had directed the council and child welfare committee to take steps for conducting the DNA test of the child.

Reacting to the latest development, Anupama, who is staging a protest in front of the welfare council, said she was happy about the order, but would continue the stir till she gets her baby back. “The order says the child would be brought back to Kerala in five days for the DNA test. The district child protection officer would be the custodian of the baby till the DNA test is over. The child would be housed in a government facility is what I assume,” she said.

The child would be brought from Andhra under police protection. “Getting back my child is one of the most important demands I have raised. But there are other important problems that need attention. It includes action against the authorities who failed to do justice. My fight would continue until all those responsible for the forced adoption of my child are punished,” Anupama said.

A Texas woman who was a program manager at an adoption agency based in Ohio has pleaded guilty to federal charges of procuring adoptions of Ugandan and Polish children by bribing Ugandan officials and defrauding authorities in this country. Debra Parris of Lake Dallas also played a role in one of the most horrific child abuse cases in North Texas, where the woman’s adult son used a Barbie doll to cause severe trauma to the private parts of his 5-year-old adopted daughter, authorities said. The girl was adopted from the agency where the North Texas woman worked. Parris pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiracy to violate the foreign corrupt practices act (FCPA) and commit visa fraud in connection with the Uganda scheme, and conspiracy to defraud the United States in connection with the Poland scheme. She is scheduled to be sentenced on March 9, 2022. Two other co-defendants, Margaret Cole, 73, of Strongsville, Ohio; and Dorah Mirembe, 41, of Kampala, Uganda, were indicted in the case. Cole was the executive director of European Adoption Consultants, and Mirembe worked for the company.

The trial against Cole is scheduled to commence on Feb. 7. Mirembe remains at large. Another North Texas woman and an employee at European Adoption Consultants, Robin Longoria of Mansfield, has pleaded guilty in the case. Information was not available Friday on her status. They were charged in Ohio, where the now closed European Adoption Consultants had been operating. The company was based in Strongsville, Ohio. The State Department said that in addition to Poland and Uganda, the agency ran adoption programs in Bulgaria, China, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Honduras, India, Panama, Tanzania and Ukraine, according to cleveland.com. Parris engaged in a scam to pay bribes to Ugandan officials to corruptly procure the adoption of Ugandan children by families in the United States, including the adoption of kids who were not properly determined to be orphaned, authorities said.

The bribes were paid to social welfare officers, Ugandan magistrate judges and court registrars. According to an indictment, Parris and other co-conspirators and the entities they worked for received more than $900,000 in connection with the adoptions. In the Poland scheme, the indictment alleges that after clients of their adoption agency determined they could not care for one of two Polish children they were set to adopt, Cole and Parris took steps to transfer the child to Parris’ relatives, who were not eligible for inter-country adoption. The girl was adopted in 2015 to John Tufts, who is Parris’ son and lived in North Texas. The Dallas Observer reported the girl told investigators that a bad guy “hurt my vagina and booty and they make it red” but she refused to identify him, according to Tufts’ arrest warrant affidavit. Tufts was charged in Denton with injury to a child — serious bodily injury, a second-degree felony. According to the affidavit, he “intentionally and knowingly caused injury to [the child] by inserting a Barbie doll into her vaginal and anal area.” Tufts’ wife was also charged. John Tufts was sentenced to 28 years in prison in March 2019, according to Denton County criminal court records. In July 2019, his now ex-wife, Georgiana Tufts, was sentenced to 10 years of probation with 90 days in jail and 240 community service hours as conditions of that probation, according to court records. After the girl was abused, the Ohio federal indictment alleges that Cole and Parris took steps to conceal their improper conduct from U.S. agencies and Polish authorities.