'Refusing divorced woman to adopt child reflects medieval conservative mindset'

The Bombay High Court has said refusing a divorced woman to adopt a child on the ground that she is working and hence would not be able to give personal attention to the child reflects a mindset of medieval conservative conceptsThe court in its order on Tuesday allowed a 47yearold woman to adopt her fouryearold nieceA single bench of Justice Gauri Godse in the order said a single parent is bound to be a working personA single parent cannot be held ineligible to be an adoptive parent on the ground that he or she is a working person it saidThe HC passed the order on the petition filed by Shabnamjahan Ansari a teacher by profession challenging an order of a civil court at Bhusawal in Jalgaon district of Maharashtra in March 2022 rejecting her application to adopt a minor girl child on the ground that she was a divorcee and a working womanAlso Read Bombay HC asks actor Nawazuddin his brother to avoid remarks against each other on social mediaThe woman had sought to adopt her sisters daughterThe civil court had in its order said since Ansari was a working woman and a divorcee she would not be able to give personal attention to the child and that the child ought to be with her biological parentsThe woman in her petition in the HC said such observation by the lower court was perverse and unjustThe HC in its order noted that the reason given by the lower court in rejecting the womans application was unfounded and baselessThe comparison done by the court between the biological mother being a housewife and the prospective adoptive mother single parent being a working lady reflects a mindset of the medieval conservative concepts of a family Justice Godse observedThe bench said when law recognises a single parent eligible to be an adoptive parent the approach of the lower court defeats the very object of the statuteGenerally a single parent is bound to be a working person maybe with some rare exceptions Thus by no stretch of imagination a single parent can be held ineligible to be an adoptive parent on the ground that he or she is a working person the high court saidIt said all statutory compliances for adoption in the present case have been done and the lower court rejected the application only on one ground that the adoptive parent is a working ladyThe reason recorded by the competent court is unfounded illegal perverse unjust and unacceptable the high court said in its orderThe HC bench while quashing the lower court order permitted the biological parents to give their minor girl child to Ansari in adoptionThe high court declared Ansari as the girls parent It also directed the Bhusawal Municipal Council to modify the childs birth certificate to include Ansaris name as the parentThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever