New Delhi: Days after the baby-selling scandal in Jharkhand, Union Minister of Women and Child Development, Maneka Gandhi, on Tuesday instructed the state governments to carry out inspection of child care homes run by Missionaries of Charity across the country.
The decision was taken after the Jharkhand child trafficking case came to light, wherein three children were rescued after being trafficked by three nuns of the Missionaries of Charity.
Furthermore, Gandhi asked the state governments to ensure registration of all child care institutions (CCI) and linking them to the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) within next month.
According to an official release, the mandatory registration of CCIs and linking to Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) has been provided in Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 which came into force more than two years ago but some orphanages had challenged the validity of this clause.
However, the Supreme Court has since dismissed the petitions and has upheld the validity; vide their order of December 2017. Since then, approximately 2300 child care institutions have been linked to CARA and about 4000 are still pending for linkage.
Gandhi has also expressed displeasure that even the children available for adoption in the 2300 CARA linked institutions have still not been brought into on the adoption system.
She is expected to discuss this issue in the meeting of the Women and Child Development Ministers of States on July 17.