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Waves of often contradictory and confusing adoption-related news have been emanating from India over the past couple of months, making getting a handle on the situation there very difficult.
For as long as I’ve been part of the international adoption world, adoption from India has been presented as problematic for non-Indians. Some in the country have even gone on record as being completely against foreigners ever raising Indian children.
Yes, there are those who’ve adopted from India on the forums and in many of the groups I visit, but the numbers of Indian-born children in adoptive families has seemed very low in comparison to to other birth countries, especially considering the immense size and population of the country. Female infanticide, which I’ve written about before, loomed as one reason for fewer than expected adoptions, but given the living conditions of a significant portion of the population, children in need of families did not seem a possible rarity.
Back in February, reports of adoption rackets and child-labor gangs were rife … a doctor and his social worker wife were arrested in Navsari for conducting illegal adoptions as part of crackdowns … and Cara, the Central Adoption Research Agency, was coming under criticism. This came as a bit of a surprise, since Cara had been touted as one of those organizations above reproach.
For a while, stories were popping up all over the place about plans to create hundreds of special orphanages … warehouse was the term I used … for the millions of unwanted baby girls, and officials indicated this would put a halt to the rampant female infanticide that plagues the country.
More recently, the Women and Child Development Ministry asked the state governments to to better involve local bodies in identifying orphans and destitute children with an eye toward placing them for adoption.
Continued …
