Govt. trying to contain fallout of ‘forced’ adoption

CPI(M) expresses solidarity with the mother

The State Government on Saturday appeared to scramble to contain the social and political fallout of the so-called ‘forced’ adoption case. It has sought legal opinion to move the court to cancel the child’s adoption and return the infant to its biological mother.

The police would investigate the questionable adoption process and the alleged falsification of the infant’s birth certificate to erase its true identity. They have already brought the child’s grandfather, a CPI(M) leader, under the ambit of its probe.

The compelling account of a young and unmarried mother’s futile search for her child “forcibly taken away from her three days after birth and given up for adoption’ via the Child Welfare Council (CWC) had resonated strongly among the public.

The controversy arguably cast the government in poor light after the woman, an SFI activist and daughter of a party leader, revealed how she and the child’s father, now married to her, was allegedly pushed from pillar to post by “CPI(M) apparatchiks and the police” in the two-year-old distressing quest for their ‘disappeared’ child.

‘An immense tragedy’

CPI(M) Polit Bureau member Vrinda Karat, who championed the case of the mother, said in New Delhi: “It is a tragedy of immense proportion. What transpired was totally wrong as far as morality and human rights are concerned. The mother needs to get her child back.”

CPI(M) State secretary A. Vijayaraghavan expressed solidarity with the mother. He denied that immorality and nepotism from party members had caused the tragedy.

CPI(M) central committee member P.K. Sreemathy said her interventions at the party and Government level for the mother had not paid off.

The Congress and the BJP regarded the Government's move with scepticism. Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan said the government's mis-steps and the CPI(M)’s political amorality forced a party woman onto the streets for her missing child.

K. Muraleedharan, MP, said the incident was an indelible blot on the CPI(M).

At least five persons, including a police officer, were injured when BJP workers attempted to storm the CWC office.

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