HYDERABAD: In a disconcerting trend, the state of Telangana has seen nearly 16 adopted children being returned to the State Adoption Resource Agency (SARA) in the last five years. The data was accessed by TNIE after National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) raised an alarm in September over the nationwide trend of adopted children being returned by their adoptive parents. The NCPCR asked the states to furnish details about the children sent back by their adoptive parents.
The information has become vital, as on Dec 5, a 14-year-old girl from Karimnagar who had been officially adopted from SARA in 2014 committed suicide amidst allegations of negligence by the adoptive parents.Telangana from its end has found that nearly 16 children were returned.
The children have been sent back to government homes or the NGOs from where they are adopted under the supervision of SARA. Interestingly, the women and child welfare department is yet to get reports on the status of the children who had been returned by their adoptive parents.
Officials are trying to find out the age of kids sent back to homes. Most of them were in their adolescent age groups. Their gender and district they belonged to. They also have to check whereabouts of other adopted children as adjustment issues can spring up for any child. The number, however, is smaller compared to other states in the country. Previous reports suggest that nearly 260-odd children were returned across the country between 2017-19, with Maharashtra and Karnataka topping the charts where 56 and 25 children respectively.
The WDCW will now also have to ascertain why these children were surrendered and if there were any systemic issues like lack of counselling and follow-ups. It is learnt that some of them were returned before the adoption process was even completed which is permissible under the rules, while others were returned years after the completion of the adoption process.
“In cases where parents decide to surrender the child after adoption process is over, a new ‘disruption’ petition has to be filed in the court, post which the legal rights of child will be taken away from parents and given to the government,” noted an official. Of the 16 children surrendered, 3 have been re-adopted by new parents.
No follow-up visits to adoptive homes
Activists note that the District Child Protection Units (DCPU) in each of the districts are not taking up the follow-up visits in adoptive homes seriously and forgetting the adopted children completely. They are, by law, supposed to prepare the family and older children to adjust to their new setting by the DCPU. But it is being done only in breach, it is said