NEW DELHI: Adoption of children in the country and abroad could become easier with the government's initiative to create an online database of children and prospective parents.The women and child development ministry and Central Adoption Resource Agency on Monday launched a web-based management information system for adoption that is aimed at making the process transparent and user friendly.
WCD minister Krishna Tirath said, "We have received complaints on delays in the adoption process and the low number of children that can be adopted. We hope that by streamlining the system, we can bring down the complaints and bring more children in need of care and protection to their adopted parents."
Currently, adoptions in India are not commensurate with the number of children in need of care and protection. Latest data shows that adoptions have shown an upward trend in 2010 — rising to 6,286 in comparison to 2,518 in 2009.
CARA is also working on strengthening adoption guidelines including verifying the source of each child placed for adoption. These guidelines — with the law ministry for their comments — aims to streamline the adoption process, facilitate expeditious adoption of children and ensure that the source of each child is verified prior to placement for adoption. It will be mandatory for 80% of the children to be adopted within the country instead of a 50:50 ratio.
The guidelines also propose norms for children with special needs to ensure more efficient placements and will make it mandatory that orphan and abandoned children be allowed to be adopted internationally under the Juvenile Justice Act.