Differently abled couples face uphill battle in adoption

“My disability did not stop me from pursuing a master’s degree in a different city, away from home. It did not stop me from working at a government office. But, I never thought it would come in my way of becoming a mother,” said KS Padmatharani, a 37-year-old woman with cerebral palsy, who faced discrimination while adopting a baby.
Three years, two home study visits and many fallouts later, it was her steely grit that helped Padmatharani in adopting a baby boy. She is a motorised wheelchair user while her husband KS Ramesh is an abled person.
The couple faced difficulties in every step of the adoption procedure. The social worker who visited their house to provide a home study report deemed them to be unfit due to Padmatharani’s disability. “The social worker was not interested to know about our parenting style or our commitment to be parents. He judged us on the face,” said Padmatharani.
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Padmatharani raised the issue with Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), which approved another home study. “Even though the second home study went convincingly, I had no hope until I got my son home,” Padmatharani said. She welcomed a three-month old boy to her house in April 2021.
Indian law (Adoption Regulations, 2022) doesn’t refrain disabled couples from becoming adoptive parents. However, deep-rooted prejudice and stigma make the procedure far from smooth for people with disabilities.
While the solution is to educate all stakeholders – social workers, medical officers and adoptive agencies, CARA has not taken an initiative in this regard.
Disabled couples go through long waiting periods, face numerous rejections and are even let down for choosing to be parents.
Four years after registering with CARA, P Baby and S Velmayil from Tamil Nadu’s Thoothukudi were deemed unfit recently (in the first week of July) citing their locomotor disabilities. “The orthopedic surgeon did not even conduct a check-up. In the medical certificate, he mentioned we were unfit,” Baby said. The adoption board rejected their application based on the certificate.
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Their case drew the attention of disabled activists in Tamil Nadu who criticised the ortho surgeon after which their case was referred to a senior medical officer. The medical certificate says the couple is fit and the adoption board processed their request. The couple welcomed a boy in the last week of July.
“Such rejections and the need to seek interventions from CARA or other authorities results in extended wait periods for no good reason,” Sugandha Agarwal, an advocate said.
While the decision makers in the adoption process attribute rejections to the welfare of the child, experts accuse them of not following the necessary procedures. “The kind of and the degree of disability should be assessed while their Home Study is being conducted and their care plan should be included in the Home Study Report to ensure that the child’s SAA has all the information in hand, rather than guessing the PAP’s abilities,” said Sugandha Agarwal.
In the case of A Bhagyam (39), whose application was not processed by the magistrate in district and sessions court, Wardha, Maharashtra, even with a positive home study report, a fitness certificate and after fostering the baby for six months.
“The magistrate said I was unfit to be a parent. I got a home study review done again, made a video of my day with my baby and submitted it to the court,” Bhagyam said, adding that these efforts convinced the magistrate. She is a polio-affected woman, with a caliper in her legs and uses a walker for support while her husband has valgus deformity. They became parents to an 18-month-old boy in 2021.
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Disabled PAPs often find themselves in the dark, with discouragement from family members. The information at the CARA website is ambiguous. “CARA’s website has information about all sections. But there is not even a single line mentioned for the disabled prospective adoptive parents (PAPs). While the question and answer section of the website had a line that it is dependent on the home study review, even that is taken off in the updated version,” Bhagyam said. Bhagyam is also fostering a baby girl now and is all set to adopt her.
Disabled PAPs are often grilled ruthlessly. “Why do you have to adopt a baby? What would you do if the baby cries? What if the child gets hungry? These are some of the silly questions generally asked in a home study review or by the adoption committee. They don’t understand how prepared we are,” Bhagyam added.
Padmatharani’s disability limits certain aspects of bonding with him. “Society can be cruel and dismissive, but my kid has been very understanding of my situation. He puts a footrest to my wheelchair and understands when I say I cannot give him a bath,” she says. They bond over books, telling tales of Elmer and the rainbow and dinosaurs.
Recollecting a heart-warming example while taking her three-year-old son to school, Bhagyam said, “My son carried his own bag, held my walker and walked with me. Generally a hyperactive boy, he waited for me to place the walker in the car before taking him in.”
Adoptive children can be innately understanding and empathetic, contrary to the popular opinion, said disabled PAPs. But societal discrimination is hindering a lot of them from taking that first step towards adoption.
A two-pronged approach has to be taken to facilitate adoption among disabled PAPs, said experts. “There should be clearly defined parameters to guide the decision making. Secondly, frequent training sessions involving case studies should be conducted for doctors, social workers and stakeholders. The fact that being differently abled does not by default disqualify people from parenthood needs to be drilled into the consciousness of all the stakeholders,” said Sugandha Agarwal. “It is all about interpretation. There will be a change when stakeholders understand that disability doesn’t mean unfit,” disability rights activist Aishwarya Rao said.
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CARA has not responded to the Right To Information (RTI) petition filed by Hindustan Times till now. In response to the questions sent over email, CARA said that they don’t have the data ‘readily available’ on disabled couples who adopted children in India.
However, state adoption resource authorities (SARA) said that there is a confusion for disabled couples going through the process of adoption. “The guidelines say PAPs should be physically sound. However, how do we interpret it? It differs from case to case. There are many criteria with less clarity, the reason why stakeholders involved are often confused,” G Kasthuri, deputy director of SARA, Tamil Nadu, while reiterating that the guidelines should be clear.
The system doesn’t favour disabled PAPs, the reason why only few of them come forward to adopt. As per the data provided by SARA, Tamil Nadu, only 11 disabled PAPs adopted children between April 2022 to July 2024. During the same period, 866 people without disabilities adopted children in Tamil Nadu.