New DelhiAugust
August 26, 2022 18:43 IST
A Public Interest Litigation (PIL) has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking simplification of legal process for child adoption.
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the Centre to apprise it of steps taken to simplify the legal process for child adoption in India. A bench headed by Justice Chandrachud asked the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development to meet the petitioner and file the reply in court within three weeks.
Hearing the petition seeking simplification of the adoption process, Justice Chandrachud asked, “Lakhs of people are waiting three-four years for adoption. Why are you making people wait so long for adoption?”
The petitioner, Piyush Saxena, said the problem is with the rules behind the adoption process.
To this, the Supreme Court said, “If the petitioner has some good suggestions, why don't you take them to the higher authorities? Why wouldn't you fix a meeting of the petitioner with some higher officials? He's a senior retired official.”
The Supreme Court in its order said, “Proceedings under article 32 highlight the deficiency in the process formulated for adoptions in the country. The request of the petitioner is that the adoption procedure may be simplified by taking steps on the ground.”
The Supreme Court asked the secretary, Women and Child Development, to depute a senior officer to meet the petitioner so the suggestions about simplifying the legal process for child adoption can be considered.
The Supreme Court asked the Center to apprise the court about the steps being taken to simplify adoption procedure. All relevant concerns of the government and public should be taken into account, the Supreme Court said.
According to the figures given in the petition, at present there are about 3 crore 10 lakh orphan children across the country, but due to legal complications, only 16,353 children have been adopted in the last five years.