Shreyas SH
Daijiworld Media Network-Mangalore
Mangalore, Oct 2: German national Maria Chaya Schupp's search for her biological mother in India, the country from where she was adopted by a German couple back in the year 1981, has thrown light on the trend of dodging the law in cases of adoption domestically and internationally.
For Maria, however, when she learnt from her foster mother that she was an abandoned street kid from India, the fact upset her, as she strongly believed in her obscure memory that she was handed over by her biological mother to Nirmala Social Welfare (NSWC), Ullal, when she was aged around 4 in between 1979 and 1980.
The German foster mother Ingrid Schupp adopted her through a pro-infant adoption agency of Germany. The agency, according to Maria, facing a ban in the country currently, had then consulted NSWC to facilitate Maria's adoption by Ingrid.
“After I attained maturity, I along with my adoptive mother, visited the NSWC and found no record of adoption at the centre,” Maria said.
Maria alleged that the centre then failed to comply with the adoption laws and indulged in illegal adoption for money. Maria further added that the centre has her name in the baptism book.
The lady then came to India with the sole intention of searching for the mother, but the situation she encountered led her to fight for the cause of thwarting illegal adoption prevailing domestically and internationally and to preserve human rights. "There could be more cases like me as adoption for many centres has become a profit making business," she claimed.
Currently, a group from Mangalore has made up its mind to support her fight. The group has formed a forum named Justice for Maria Chaya to impart awareness, while simultaneously launching a comprehensive investigation on such cases.
Maria’s adoption was illegal due to the handling of the adoption done by Madurai district court. “Since the girl made her brief stay in an adoption centre, NSWC in Ullal, Mangalore, as per the then Guardians and Wards Act 1890, the centre should have been adhered to the law and consulted the district court of Mangalore rather than the Madurai court," said advocate Dinesh Hegde Ulepady, who is currently Maria’s advocate.
However, in 2006, after Maria failed to procure documents of her biological mother from NSWC centre, she moved the high court of Karnataka. The HC directed the Ullal police to investigate the matter, for which it presented that documents were damaged due to heavy rains. The court transferred the case to the lower court, JMFC III, to resolve the issue.
The advocate contended that before 1983, adoption institutions functioning across the nation were blatantly ignoring the regulatory bodies Indian Council of Social Welfare and Council of Child Welfare. After Supreme Court’s direction to the government of India in one of the petitions filed in the SC in connection of violating the norms in 1983, gradually reform kick-started, Ulepady said.
Maria's adoption case was tried in the district court of Madurai, with a lady named Selvam Raj Kennet filing a petition for adoption in 1980. “I have no idea who that Selvam Raj is,” Maria said. Meanwhile she argued she had no memory of being taken to Madurai.
“My adoptive mother paid 5,000 Deutsche Mark in 1980, (RS 39,800 according Indian value in 1980) for adopting me.” She alleged that Selvam and NSWC centre had shared the money to send her out from India. “I want to send Selvam and sisters of NSWC to jail,” she hit out.
After a group of people under the banner of Justice for Maria Chaya took up the issue, two such cases were reported to the forum. Ulepady, who guides the venture of Justice for Maria Chaya alleged that a few institutions domestically and internationally are abusing adoption law and only piling up money and degrading human rights.