Mumbai: The Bombay high court has directed the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) to decide on an application by an unwed mother to revoke/cancel a surrender deed and grant her custody of her 2-month-old baby. A vacation bench of Justices Nitin Borkar and Somasekhar Sundaresan on Monday heard a petition by the woman, 23, seeking to declare the surrender deed as null and void and to restrain CWC and Asha Sadan Balgruh, an adoption group, from giving the child in adoption.
The woman’s plea contended that she was sexually and physically abused by her boss in the UAE. It was only six months that she realised that she was pregnant. Since she comes from a conservative family, she hid it from them, her plea said. Her old contacts from working as a social worker in Kalyan, asked her to go to Asha Sadan Balgruh in Byculla, where she delivered a daughter on March 29. Subsequently, her family supported her.
On April 5, when she asked to take her baby home, she was made to sign a deed of surrender and told it had the “effect and consequence of surrendering her child” and she has time of 60 days to revoke/reconsider the same. Her plea contends that she never wanted to surrender her child but the social worker, in charge of her case at Asha Sadan, said “this was the only way to get her child back.”
The woman went to Asha Sadan on April 26 with her advocate and made an application under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children Act) regarding reconsideration of her wish to surrender her child and for revocation/cancellation of the surrender deed. However, the social worker did not accept her application.
She then went to CWC in Matunga on April 30. On May 2, she was given a hearing by CWC and asked them to coordinate with the social worker. Stating that the respondents Asha Sadan and CWC have failed to comply with provisions of the JJ Act, her plea states, “without her child, the petitioner is dying several deaths every single day that goes by without her child in her arms”.
Advocate for Asha Sadan informed the bench that the woman is free to come and stay with the baby. “After doing so much, such allegations hurt,” the advocate said. On a court query, he said that the child is not declared free for adoption. A representative from CWC said that it would decide on the woman’s application in a day or two. The HC has asked to inform them about the decision on May 29.
