Child Adoption In India

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Introduction
Children are considered a bundle of joy and on whom the future of the country depends. While on one hand children born in India are being pampered, taken care of and given all the necessities for their all-round development, on the other hand there are over 60,000 children being abandoned per year in India . In some cases, these children become victims of human trafficking and sexual violence. In fortunate cases, the abandoned children are taken to any adoption agency and may hope for a better life while waiting to get adopted.
Such cases, of children being given a chance at a second life through adoption are on the rise. In its simplest of senses, adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting for another …show more content…

The reason for this is mostly because of the belief that a son was indispensable for spiritual as well as material welfare of the family .
Under the old Hindu Law, only a male could be adopted and an orphan could not be adopted. A female child could not be adopted under the Hindu Law. Under the old Hindu law, only the male had a right to adopt and the consent or dissent of his wife to the proposed adoption was immaterial.
But such restrictions have changed in the course of time. Such gender biases have been minimized in today’s modern society. Under the modern Hindu Law, every Hindu, male or female has the capacity to make an adoption provided he or she has attained majority and are of sound mind. Most of these laws, rules and regulations have been enumerated in the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act of 1956.
Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act, 1956
The Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act was passed after Independence as part of modernizing and codifying Hindu Law on adoption. The Act to some extent reflects the principles of equality and social justice by removing several (though not all) gender based discriminatory …show more content…

A married female cannot adopt, not even with the husband’s consent, unless her husband dies or suffers from any disability or renounces the world or so. On the other hand, a husband may adopt with the consent of the wife. Similarly, in the matter of a giving a child in adoption, the Hindu male enjoys broader rights than a corresponding female. It is time that law, in this age of equality, takes cognizance of the same and give equal rights to both men and women with regard to adoption. There is no reason to give to the husband veto power to deny fulfilment of maternal instincts of his

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