‘They want to see granny before she loses her mind’

Nineyearold Elena Gil was dealing with tragedies unprecedented for her little heart Her mother Maria Luz had been bedridden for a year after a motorbike accident two years after her father Juan succumbed to brain cancer The beauty of her town Maacutelaga in the hills of southern Spain did nothing to dull this painGil now 47 and her husband Upal Basu49 are on a Zoom call with us The couple resides in Bengaluru and Maria 85 has Alzheimerrsquos and still resides in Maacutelaga She wants to see her four grandchildren before she loses all mental faculties The catch Gil and Basursquos children are adopted and they are racing against time to get them Spanish passportsldquoI always thought I would adopt two girls and when I moved to India in 2013 it was somewhere at the back of my mindrdquo says Gil wearing a grey sweater and a pair of glasses flanked by auburn tresses Basu an architect speaks to us from Goa ldquoElena shows them her hometown and their grandmother and the children want to meet her They want to see where their mother grew uprdquo he says Wearing a green shirt the curlyhaired man wears the look of someone who doesnrsquot lose his calm too often ldquoIt has already been an uphill climb to adopt the children we hadnrsquot anticipated this strugglerdquo he addsElena Gil is working against the clock to try and get her four children to meet her sick mother in Spain before itrsquos too late PicNilanjan MukherjeeGil has an Overseas Citizenship of India OCI card since she is married to an Indian national When the couple decided to adopt soon after getting married in 2018 Gil asked the Spanish Consulate what this would entail for the family ldquoWhen I went to the Spanish Consulate in Mumbai in 2020 they told me that my adopted Indian children would have no issues getting a Spanish passportrdquo she says ldquoI met the children thrice in the course of a few months They had already been separated as two of them were below six years of age two were above They came home in May 2021rdquoGil then started asking how they could proceed to get the children Spanish passports in 2022 ldquoThe Consul I had spoken to during the adoption process was transferred and the new Consul Fernando Heredia Noguer has been dragging their feetrdquo says Gil ldquoWhen I finally threatened to go to the media over the delay they sent us a list of mistakes in our adoption certificatemdashtrivial things such as translating the Hindi lsquoSrsquo to lsquoShrsquo in Spanish The adoption certificate being a document of lsquonon contesting naturersquo there are other minor mistakes that canrsquot be modified by the Indian family courtrdquoDesperation grew when news of Mariarsquos sinking health trickled in early this year ldquoAfter twenty four flights to Spain cancelled finally the Spanish Consulate agreed to grant them the possibility of travelling with Indian passports in February 2024 But recently the Consul dropped a bomb on us the tourist visa needed to be submitted before the new Spanish Consul steps in from July 31st I feel like Irsquom being punished for adopting locallyrdquo adds GilKanika Kapoor with the kids and Husband RameshThe couple now has an appointment on August 5 at the Passport office For the third time they will start the application process from scratchThe GilBasu childrenrsquos road to an Indian passport may be a tough one like Kanika Kapoorrsquos The Art of Living coach lives in Bandra and adopted her two children in November 2020 when she and her husband lived in Bengaluru ldquoI am AmericanCanadian and my husband has a Canadian passportrdquo she says ldquoMy husband and I were born Indian but moved to the US and Canada and became citizens In 2017 we wanted to move back and adopt siblings Our children came home only nine months after we applied for adoption but it took us longer to get their Indian passportsrdquoFirst came the shock that there is no Tatkal path for passports for adopted children ldquoAt the passport office the conversation started with lsquoHow come you have an American passport but your children are Indianrsquordquo says Kapoor ldquoWe had to explain to each officer that they were adopted and there was a provision under law for this I think there arenrsquot any SOPs Standard Operating Procedures for children adopted by OCI and the officers are in the dark Itrsquos a lucky draw of variables for things to go your waymdashthe passport officer should be in a good mood or the applicant speaking an Indian languagerdquo Kapoor can only hope that getting an American passport for her children will not be as difficultAdvocate Shruti Jadhav Smriti Gupta and Susan AbrahamOn July 16 the government notified the intent to allow OCI and NRI persons to adopt Indian children under the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act 1956 HAMAThe move comes after a long drawnout debate over there being no mechanism for intercountry adoption under HAMA which comes under the juvenile justice system CARA Central Adoption Resource Authority is the only authority for intercountry adoptions and its NOC is mandatory under the Hague Conventionmdasha series of international treatiesmdashto rule out child trafficking lsquoFree to Surrenderrsquo is another clearance that comes from CARA which makes the children legally free to be adopted It is the biggest hurdle in matching prospective adoptive parents PAP with children in the systemAdvocate Shruti Jadhav has worked extensively in the NGO sector and represented victims of domestic violence sexual violence women and children ldquoUntil 2012rdquo she says ldquoeven though CARA existed the adoption process was not centralised the State Adoption Resource Agency SARA oversaw it instead and it gave the opportunity to certain parties to exploit the loopholesrdquoAn Italian couple Cristiano Enriko Borgi and Siyeara Ketenioyeke adopted a three year old girl called Srea This was on the occasion of InterCountry Adoption Ceremony at Agartala capital ofTripura back in 2018 File picGetty ImagesShe points out that well into the 2000s foreigners came to India for cheap labour ldquoPeople would go to shelter homes in different states and cherrypick children from a lineuprdquo she says ldquoAdoption was one of the easiest ways to get labour that was not just cheap it was free However after CARA took over the adoption process there was conscious effort to stop such exploitation This unfortunately also resulted in making adoption more difficult in some genuine casesrdquo One measure in place is that foreign or OCI persons who want to adopt Indian children have to prove cohabitation for at least two yearsShe admits that cases like GilBasursquos can suffer due to the tedious process ldquoI donrsquot doubt her intentionrdquo Jadhav says ldquobut I would urge her to not lose heart Every Consulate has a system of checks and balances and if someone is dragging their feet she can complain to the appellate authority withinthe ConsulaterdquoPunersquos Smriti Gupta who has adopted a child feels that many OCIs lack information ldquoAdoption is difficult anywayrdquo she says ldquoAnd it can be complicated for OCI parents who donrsquot have access or knowledge of SOPs Standard Operating Procedure I understand that these rules are in place for the safety of the children but many OCIs are in the complete dark about how to navigate the systemrdquo Shersquos part of a support group that guides PAPs on the CARA clearances neededAdvocate Susan Abraham who has worked with Indian Association for the Promotion of Adoption amp Child Welfare IAPAmdashset up in the 1970s to work with vulnerable and disadvantaged childrenmdashand helped secure a family for those so deprived by promoting ldquoadoptionrdquo feels that not just OCIrsquos but Indians are facing the same issues due to ill thought out laws and acts ldquoIf you think OCIs face difficulties in adoption procedure think again Because Indian citizens face far greater hurdles At one time there used to be a concept of promoting adoption Today what we have is ldquopreventionrsquo instead of promotion by entangling the whole procedure in legaleserdquo she says She lays the blame on the Juvenile Justice Act ldquoWe can thank the illthought out and hastily enacted Juvenile Justice Care amp Protection of Children Act 2015 for the mess not just OCIs but Indian PAPs are facing As Gil waits to take her children home she says ldquoWe were not told how their biological parents died The older girls told us that the mother went yellow and died at home The father just collapsed suddenly and died a few months later We have a long road of healing ahead of usmdashthe youngest child was only two when he lost his parentsrdquoWe explain that the process guards the safety of the children to which their mother replies ldquoI donrsquot have a problem doing the work to guarantee their safety It is quite sad that the most difficult part in our entire process has been the Spanish government delays and contradictory guidelines If even the tourist visa for the kids to travel and meet their Spanish family is refused Irsquoll pitch a tent outside the consulatehelliprdquoThe Spanish Consulate did not respond to our email regarding the GilBasu children A tent might get their attention4068LNo of OCI cards issued in 2022 Overseas Citizenship of India OCI is a form of permanent residency available to foreigners of Indian origin and their spouses to live and work in India24No of flights cancelled to SpainIn 2023 thenMP Smriti Irani stated in Parliament 3142 children were adopted by foreign nationals in 20202021 The number stood at 431 in 20222023