42 Children Rescued From Indian Orphanage

Investigators said the centre, Shejar Chaya, which was launched in 1985, had been under the scanner for more than a month, and that it ran a major adoption racket wherein majority of the children were given away to foreign nationals. The investigators also said that a six-year-old inmate died on January 31, but the centre didn’t even inform police or any other agency, nor did it bother to get an autopsy done.

Most of the children rescued on Monday were under the age of six years, and have been sent to shelters in Nerul, Dombivili and Bhiwandi.

The Indian adoption rules state that shelters must give 80 per cent of inmates for adoption to Indians, and 20 per cent for inter-country (foreign) adoptions, provided Indian nationals are not in the queue.

District Child Protection Officer Parmeshwar Dhasade said the investigation suggested Shejar Chaya has given for adoption more than 50 per cent of its inmates to foreign nationals.

Investigators said that foreigners desperate to adopt kids readily pay more than the $5,000 fee prescribed by the government, while Indians need to pay only Rs 40,000.

The shelter owner, Father Francis Gonsalves, rubbished the allegations, saying: “They did their own investigation without even giving me a chance to explain. I will prove these charges wrong in coming days.” He said the shelter has given out 950 children for adoption since its inception 29 years ago.

The tip-off

The DWCD and CWC received a tip-off a couple of months ago that the shelter was demanding Rs 5 lakh from parents looking to adopt children. The tip-off also revealed that most of the kids were given to foreigners.

The subsequent questioning of the shelter officials revealed that documents regarding the inmates were missing/not being maintained since 2006. In 20 cases where kids were suspected to have been given for adoption to foreigners, the shelter “conveniently had no papers”, the investigators said.

One of the investigators said, “The adoption papers were not in place. The shelter officials also didn’t have reports of the home visits to check on children who were sent out of India. In cases of inter-country adoptions, authorised agencies abroad must send reports about well-being of the children. We have sought details of all the children the shelter gave for adoption to foreigners.”

In another major anomaly, the investigators found that 58 kids were brought to the shelter without the knowledge of the Child Welfare Committee, which is the sole authority in assigning children to shelter homes. “Prima facie inspection revealed that 58 children were brought in without CWC’s knowledge. The children were brought from random places or taken away from helpless parents, and given up for adoption for huge amount of money,” a CWC member said. The investigators also found that two more children had died at the shelter in the past few years, and the deaths were never reported to police or other authorities.

“Everything points to some sort of adoption racket,” Dhasade said, while CWC member Sumitra Aashtikar added that detailed investigation could reveal more illegalities. “We suspect that children were being brought from random places without proper paperwork, and placing them in homes without background check or documentation,” she said.”