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INDIA-CHILDREN-TERESA-ADOPTION-CRIME
India orders all Mother Teresa care homes inspected
NEW DELHI, July 17, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – India has ordered an immediate
inspection of all childcare homes run by a religious order founded by Mother
Teresa after a nun was arrested over an alleged adoption racket.
Illegal adoption is big business in India, with over 100,000 children
reported missing every year, the government says. Many are given up by
desperately poor parents but others are snatched from hospitals and train
stations.
Police earlier this month arrested the nun and a worker at one of the
Missionaries of Charity order’s homes in Ranchi, the capital of eastern
Jharkhand state, over allegations that at least five infants were sold for
potentially thousands of dollars.
The scandal blew up after local child welfare authorities informed police
about a newborn missing from the home, which is meant to care for unwed
pregnant women and mothers in distress.
In a statement late Monday, Women and Child Development Minister Maneka
Gandhi said all state governments have been asked “to get child care homes
run by Missionaries of Charity all over the country inspected immediately.”
She also said all childcare institutions should be registered and linked to
the central adoption authority within the next month.
In December India’s Supreme Court had ordered mandatory registration of all
childcare institutions and bringing orphanages under the central adoption
system.
Since then some 2,300 childcare institutions have been linked to the
Central Adoption Resource Authority and about 4,000 are still pending,
according to the government.
In the aftermath of the adoption scandal, the Missionaries of Charity had
said it would carefully look into the Jharkhand case and ensure the incident
was never repeated.
The charity was founded in 1946 by Mother Teresa, a global symbol of
compassion who was canonised as a saint after her death in 1997.
Headquartered in Kolkata in eastern India, the charity runs several
institutions across the country.
Missionaries of Charity was previously involved in providing legal adoption
services in India, but in 2015 said it was closing down its adoption centres,
citing new regulations that made it easier for single and divorced people to
adopt children.
BSS/AFP/MSY/1028 hrs