New norms make adoption easier

But lack of personal touch key drawback in online process

The search for a child to adopt seemed endless for Parvathi and Shivashankar (names changed), a childless couple from Bengaluru. Having registered under State Adoption Resource Agency (SARA) way back in 2012, the couple, who had almost lost hope of a child, were in for good news. Thanks to the recent reform adopted by Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), they could adopt a child from Maharashtra. 

Similarly, hundreds of Prospective Adoptive Parents (PAP) had a reason to smile after new guidelines were put in place this year, based on the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000. Besides, the institution-specific adoption process was scrapped for the introduction of modified online system, with additional features such as waiting list (first come, first served), inter-state and country adoptions in place. As a result, as many as 258 parents (till September) from Karnataka alone were able to adopt children of other states. Moreover, the new methodology is going to help prospective adoptive parents from Karnataka, as the State has a huge demand for adopting children.

A whopping 10,067 parents have registered to adopt a child with SARA. However, there are only 215 adoptive children in the State, 13 of them specially abled children.

Transparent process
The couple, requesting anonymity, said they were discouraged to adopt a baby in a Bengaluru-based Specialised Adoption Agency (SAA), given their response. The state-owned agencies would give adoptive children to ‘selected people’ directly from the hospitals and the process was not transparent. However, CARA found a new way.

“With the new system in place, we were able to find three adoptive children of Maharashtra (along with the photos) in just three months after we registered and 48 hours were given to us to reserve any of them,” they told Deccan Herald.

Initially, we thought of going to all these three state-owned agencies in Maharashtra and select one of the babies. Later, we dropped the idea and chose a baby girl from Mumbai with a gut feeling that there would have been no choice to make had my wife conceived biologically.

Demerits
On the other hand, registering online may come with its own set of problems. Malathy, a senior official, who works at a Bengaluru-based SAA, said the online system was faster but impersonal. Prospective Adoptive Parents can reserve the adoptive child online after seeing the photos and documents, which are uploaded by the respective SAAs. Here, a personal touch and emotional bond is missing, while choosing a child based on photos. At times, the uploaded photos are not recent and parents, who travel to the respective state, are surprised to see a different child in reality (by complexion and age). Secondly, the penetration of online system is poor in the rural areas, she said.