Spaniard, Kiwi adopt Bihar girl each
PATNA: Two girl children of Bihar have been adopted by a woman each from Spain and New Zealand.
The girls from Bhagalpur had been abandoned by their biological parents. Living under the care of Bihar State Adoption Resource Agency (SARA) of the state social welfare department, they were brought to Patna and handed over to their adopted mothers on Thursday.
Sources said four-year-old Preeti, who had been with the SARA for the past two years, was adopted by Spain's Susana Gomez who works with the agriculture department in her country.
Clinical psychologist Melanie Kathleen Mary Simons from New Zealand adopted seven-year-old Minu Bharti, who had been with the SARA since 2012. Simons adopted another Indian child from Delhi's state adoptive agency three years ago.
"Although the adoption process took over a year to be completed, the agencies were cooperative. I chose India as it allows single parents to adopt children," Simons told this reporter.
Susana has taken six-month leave to spend time with her adopted daughter. "I have planned to hire a Spanish tutor to prepare Preeti for school. Young children are quick to pick up languages. I have engaged a Hindi teacher for myself. The Hindi tutor will also ensure that Preeti remembers her native language," said Susana.
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These are good humanitarian acts but hope adopted girls are not ill treated and used as slave.
Mithilesh Kumar
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The two foreigners had registered themselves a year ago with the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), a statutory body of the Union ministry of women and child development. "They fulfilled the criteria... An online meeting was also organised between the mothers and their respective children. They completed a lengthy legal process," said a source.
According to SARA's Brajesh Kumar, Bihar has 21 registered agencies with 189 children who can be adopted. Legal formalities have been completed for making 103 of them available for adoption. Twelve boys and 60 girls of the 103 kids have already been adopted. Nine of them have been adopted by foreign citizens.
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