Differing procedures based on faith against the Constitution

The Supreme Court on Friday asked the government to respond to a plea seeking uniform, religious and gender neutral grounds for adoption and guardianship of children in the country.

A Bench led by Chief Justice of India Sharad A. Bobde issued notice to the Centre on the plea by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay that people of different faiths continue to follow different statutes and personal laws in matters of adoption and guardianship.

“Even after years of Independence, adoption and guardianship procedures are very complex cumbersome and neither gender nor religion neutral,” the petition said.

It said Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Jains are dealt with Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act and Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act. Muslims, Christians and Parsis have their own personal laws. Couples belonging to different religions have to seek adoption under the JJ Act of 2000. NRIs, overseas citizens and foreign prospective adoptive parents, living in a country which is signatory to the Hague Adoption Convention and wish to adopt Indian child, need to approach an authorised foreign adoption agency or central authority subject to the Adoption Regulation of 2017.

Couples secured guardianship orders in India in 2011, with view to adopting the children in Ireland

A High Court judge has criticised a nine-year delay by the Adoption Authority of Ireland in making adoption orders for four Indian children living here since 2011 with couples anxious to adopt them.

Mr Justice John Jordan said the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption required the relevant authorities “shall act expeditiously in the process of adoption”.

In these cases, causing or allowing a delay between 2011 and 2020 “is not acting expeditiously – if that is not an understatement”, he said. Time and expedition “should be measured in weeks and months – and not in years”.

He made the comments in a judgment granting applications by the Child and Family Agency and three couples for orders authorising the authority to make adoption orders concerning the four children, aged 11-15, including two siblings.

A High Court judge has criticised a nine-year delay by the Adoption Authority of Ireland in making adoption orders for four Indian children living here since 2011 with couples anxious to adopt them.

Mr Justice John Jordan said the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption requires the relevant authorities “shall act expeditiously in the process of adoption”.

In these cases, causing or allowing a delay between 2011 and 2020 “is not acting expeditiously – if that is not an understatement”, he said. Time and expedition "should be measured in weeks and months and not in years”.

He made the comments in a judgment granting applications by the Child and Family Agency and three couples authorising the Authority to make adoption orders concerning the four children, aged between 11 and 15, including two siblings.

The children were described as “orphans” in documents from the relevant Indian authority but other documents from the same authority said they had been “abandoned”.

Globally, an estimated 580 (approximately 5-8% of couples) million people experience infertility, with more than half, 372 million in lower and middle-income countries (WHO, 2004). Africa has the largest burden of 10-32% of infertile couples (Okonofua, 2005).

On 20th January 2021, the Ghana Medical Council (MDC) and the Economic and Organized Crime Office (EOCO) issued a joint statement about the involvement of some medical practitioners, social welfare officers and individuals in what appears to be a complicated syndicate involving baby harvesting and baby selling using trusted government facilities and departments like hospitals and the department of social welfare as a conduit. The disturbing news flooded the nation’s traditional and new media as Ghanaian expressed their shock.

The MDC and EOCO needs to be commended for the painstaking and detailed undercover work from June to November 2020, which led to the subsequent arrest of some the culprits. It is our hope that, those found culpable will be made to face the full rigors of the law and not left off the hook as happens with some criminal cases so as to end the culture of impunity and to serve as a deterrent to others who may want to engage is such albeit “lucrative” illegality and inhumane acts.

While recognizing the great sacrifices and contributions of health and social workers to promote “the best interest of the child”in line with Ghana’s Children Act and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, there is an urgent need to address the emerging worrying trend of baby selling, baby stealing and missing babies which has the likelihood of entrenching the practice of baby harvesting.

To nip this emerging canker in the bud, RISE-Ghana wishes to highlight the following concerns to improve policy and practice:

Like 25 other couples, Genkenaar Christophe Claes and his husband Koen Segher have been waiting for an adopted child for much longer than average. A damning report from the Flemish Ombudsman Service now shows that their trajectory has been unfair and non-transparent. But the couple cannot count on a solution for the time being.

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THE OIREACHTAS CHILDREN’S Committee is set to invite the chairperson of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes to appear before it.

The committee made the decision at a private meeting yesterday and plans to send a letter to Judge Yvonne Murphy, the chair of the three-person commission, in the coming days.

Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman, whose department oversaw the release of the report, will be invited to attend a separate meeting with the committee.

Survivors will also be asked to attend another hearing so they can raise any questions or concerns they have.

The report, spanning 2,865 pages, details the experiences of women and children who lived in 14 mother and baby homes and four county homes between 1922 and 1998. It was published on 12 January, nearly six years after the commission was first set up.

HYDERABAD: Making it clear that the states leading lone battles against

child traffickers may not yield better results and that they should make the

central government an integral part in the battle against the inhuman

trafficking mafia, the Telangana high court on Thursday made the union

women and child welfare ministry as a necessary party to a batch of cases

Eight women, including five expectant mothers, have been arrested for suspected child trafficking in Oba, Anambra State.

Police spokesman Haruna Mohammed who disclosed this on Wednesday, said the suspects were arrested in the house of one Melvina Uju Uba during a police raid.

He said eight children, including five newborns, were rescued during the operation.

He said, “On 26/1/2021 about 7:am, following an intelligence report, police operatives attached to the SIB and Area Command, Oraifite, coordinated by the Area Commander, ACP Afolabi Wilfred, raided the house of one Melvina Uju Uba, ‘f’, located opposite Nnamdi Azikiwe Orthopaedic Teaching Hospital Oba in Idemili South LGA of Anambra State.

“The place was raided following credible information that teenage girls were being impregnated and the babies sold out by human traffickers.

As we move into a new Democratic administration, ending family separation inflicted by the so-called child welfare system should be a top priority. Specifically, the Biden administration should refuse to sanction the federal government’s endorsement of arbitrary timelines that permanently tear families apart. That means repealing the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997. 

ASFA was developed at a time when our country was hysterical about “crack babies” and resentful of their poor, mostly Black, parents. Media coverage focused on these selfish, drug-addicted parents who were giving birth to permanently damaged infants. As a result, many children were spending years in foster care with little pressure on systems to reunify them with parents or find them an adoptive home. 

The law ties federal child welfare funding to a requirement that, with a few exceptions, states move to terminate the rights of parents whose children have been in foster care for 15 of the past 22 months. After that period, the children become eligible for adoption. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a light on the arbitrary and unfair nature of this timeline and which parents are most unlikely to meet it. Parents who are unable to visit with their children or participate in services recommended by CPS in furtherance of reunification during the pandemic are unsure whether their parental rights will be terminated. Even in normal times, for incarcerated parents whose ability to visit with their children or access services is out of their control, this timeline is usually out of reach.  

This is true regardless of whether the crime for which the parents are incarcerated had anything to do with the children. Many parents are held pre-trial because of their inability to pay cash bail before entering jails, which are even less likely to have services than prisons. Similarly, for many parents who are struggling with addiction — where relapse is often a part of recovery — this timeline is simply unrealistic. 

THE ARCHBISHOPS OF the Catholic Church and the Church of Ireland have expressed shame over mother and baby homes.

More than 10,000 women and girls entered institutions for unmarried mothers across Northern Ireland between 1922 and 1990, and a report has revealed claims of inappropriate labour and being stigmatised at the homes, run by Catholic orders and Protestant clergy.

A “victim-centred” independent investigation was ordered by Stormont ministers and should be completed within six months.

The Bishop of Derry, Donal McKeown, said all historic records from the homes should be released in full.

“If anyone is trying to hide records or destroy records, that is a crime. Of course there is no reason why records should be withheld because people want to know who they are,” McKeown told the BBC.