CWC To Decide If Unwed Mom Can Reclaim Baby: HC
CWC To Decide If Unwed Mom Can Reclaim Baby: HC
|Rosy Sequeira | May 29, 2024, 04:04 IST
SHAREFOLLOW US
Mumbai: Bombay High Court asked the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) to pass its order on an unwed mother’s application to cancel a surrender deed and give her custody of her two-month-old baby.Justices Nitin Borkar and Somasekhar Sundaresan heard a petition by the woman (23) on Monday to declare the surrender deed as null and void and to restrain CWC (Mumbai City-I) and Asha Sadan Balgruh from putting up the child for adoption.Her petition said while working abroad she was sexually and physically manipulated and abused by her boss. Only after six months did she realise that she was pregnant. As she comes from a conservative family, she hid her pregnancy from them. Through her old contacts as a social worker in Mumbai, she was directed to go to Asha Sadan Balgruh in the city. She delivered a girl on March 29. Her family later supported her.When she asked if she could take her baby home, the woman was made to sign a deed of surrender of the child on April 5. She was told it had the consequence and effect of her surrendering her child and she would get 60 days to revoke/reconsider it. Her photograph was taken with the child.The woman’s petition said she never wanted to surrender her baby but the social worker (case in-charge) at Asha Sadan, said, “this was the only way to get her child back”.On April 26, the woman went with her advocate to Asha Sadan with her application under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act for revocation/cancellation of the surrender deed. But the social worker did not accept it. On April 30, she was taken to CWC, Matunga. On May 2, CWC gave the woman a hearing. Her petition said Asha Sadan and CWC have failed to comply with provisions of the JJ Act till date and she is “aggrieved and dissatisfied ” by CWC’s conduct in not deciding her application for reclaiming her child.She said with her child she can move mountains and obstacles, but she “is dying several deaths, every single day that goes by without her child in her arms”.The advocate for Asha Sadan said she is free to come and stay with the baby. “After doing so much, such allegations hurt,” he added. To the judges’ query, he replied that CWC has not declared the child as free for adoption. A CWC representative said it will pass an order on the woman's application in “one-two days”.The judges then asked CWC to pass the order and inform them about it on Wednesday.