New method helps orphaned kids find new family

Orphaned and abandoned children who were unable to find a home for several years because of a minor physical deformity or an ailment are now being adopted, thanks to a new approach embraced by the government's central adoption body.
One third of the 177 children identified as "hard to place" have already been matched with prospective families within a span of two months and will soon be adopted.
The new method adopted by Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) filters "hard to place" children from its adoption pool to make them available for "immediate placement".
Children are identified as "hard to place" if they have been referred to prospective adoptive parents 15 times and yet have not been reserved by a family.

These are children who do not fall in the "special needs" category but because of small medical condition or due to their age are often not selected from the adoption pool.
Since the launch of this scheme in late September, 177 children have been identified as "hard to place". Of these, 56 have now been successfully matched with families and will soon be adopted.

"These were children with either minor physical problems, or those children who were once HIV positive but now have turned HIV negative. There could also be a child with a carrier disease," Deepak Kumar, CEO of CARA said.

"While the health issues are not major, prospective adoptive parents did not want to take them home. However, these are the children who need to be placed with families the most so that these families can nurture them and provide them proper medical attention," he said.
Normally, parents seeking to adopt are offered an option of three children by CARA. This procedure of referral and matching a child with the requirements of adoptive parents usually takes up to 10-12 months. But through the process of "immediate placement" this waiting period is drastically shortened.
"When parents opt for this separate pool they have a readily available set of children before them. They can view their profile and reserve a child thus eliminating a long waiting period," Kumar added.

In the Juvenile Justice Act 2015 among the principles to be followed to ensure care and protection for children is the principle of "positive measures", defined as "mobilisation of all resources including those of family and community, for promoting the well-being, facilitating development of identity and providing an inclusive and enabling environment, to reduce vulnerabilities of children.