Women and Child Development Minister Renuka Chowdhury said a national database of children who can be adopted has to be created.
NEW DELHI: Admitting that there was a lack of transparency in the adoption set-up, Women and Child Development Minister Renuka Chowdhury on Thursday said all adoption agencies must be linked together and a national database of children who can be adopted has to be created.
"It is a matter of shame that illegal adoptions still take place. We have to set right the various loopholes in the laws and in the system," she said inaugurating a two-day national meeting on adoption here.
Noting that there was lack of transparency in the adoption system, she said, "All agencies involved in adoptions should be linked centrally and a consolidated database of children should be created."
This, she said, would help people find out with ease where they can adopt a child from.
The Minister, who referred to the difficulties she had to face when she adopted a baby girl who is now 22 years old, said procedural bottlenecks have to be removed and the adoption process should be made less cumbersome.
Chowdhury also said proper follow-up should be carried out to ensure that no trafficking took place under the garb of adoption.
She said the Ministry has proposed a 'cradle scheme' for putting up for adoption abandoned girl children to put a check on foeticide and infanticide.
Chowdhury said while preference was still being given to in-country adoption, her Ministry has suggested amendments in the adoption laws to make inter-country adoptions simpler.
Chairperson of Central Adoption Resource Agency (CARA) JK Mittal said the states should register all adoption agencies and create a database of children who are available for adoption.
He said there were more parents now in queue waiting to adopt than there were children.
Only about 3,500 adoptions take place legally in the country in a year.
Mittal said the adoption guidelines need to be revised to make the procedure more friendly for children and the prospective parents.
The two-day meeting, organised by CARA, is being attended by representatives of state governments, NGOs and adoption coordinating agencies.
The meeting will have the state governments giving their feedback on various issues pertaining to adoption, including the guidelines and procedure.
It will also review the adoption laws and suggest changes.
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