Panaji, May 19 (IANS): The Goa Police on Wednesday warned against illegal adoption of 'Covid orphans', days after some social media posts urging people to adopt children whose parents had succumbed to the deadly pandemic, went viral.

"Recently we had come across some social media posts that were talking about children who had become orphan because of Covid. Those posts were urging people to take Covid orphans for adoption. So we noticed that this trend was picking up slowly. Adoption is a field which is closely monitored by legal agencies and there is a proper law in place which governs adoption," Goa Police public relations officer Shobit Saxena said.

"All adoption must follow the law in place. That is we have taken out a poster recently, making people aware about procedure which needs to be followed for legal adoption. Any illegal adoption without following those procedures is not valid, it may result an offence under Indian Penal Code and other acts," Saxena also said, urging people to verify the antecedents of agencies who are putting up children for adoption.