Soon, portal for NRIs and other foreign applicants to track child adoption

The move will help NRIs, OCIs as well as foreign nationals who apply for inter-country adoption

The central adoption body Child Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) is planning to set up a portal to help prospective parents from outside India track the status of their applications instead of relying solely on their country's authorised agency.

The move will help non-resident Indians (NRIs), Overseas Citizens of India (OCIs) as well as foreign nationals who apply for inter-country adoption.

While domestic applicants can register on their own on the website of CARA, candidates from outside India have to route their applications via an authorised foreign adoption agency (AFAA) or a central authority (CA) which then registers them on the CARA website.

Once it is ready, the new portal will allow parents to access information after they register with an AFAA or CA.

"The online module will give such parents direct access to information which until now they could not get on their own. Parents often get anxious when an authorised foreign adoption agency fails to update them on important information and we are trying to bridge that gap," said CARA CEO Lt Col Deepak Kumar.

Overseas applicants will be given a username and a password and they will be able to check whether details filled by an AFAA such as age of the child are according to their requirement.

Prospective parents will also be able to track whether their application has been approved by CARA, their place in the waiting list and will be able to find out when children are referred to them for adoption as well as access their profiles, et al.

"We will be able to ensure greater transparency and provide better services to parents who often complain about how the agency they are dealing with is clueless on the status of their application and is not able to provide information on time. We will also have fewer grievances," Kumar said.

The move to provide an information window to foreign applicants follows requests from both AFAA and prospective parents during a recent interaction with the CARA CEO on Facebook.

A member with one of the AFAAs in Spain, Sandrine Perrotton, asked Kumar for a "tool" which would help parents track their place in the waiting list "so that we could comfort the families in their wait and keep them informed".

"Please activate or introduce an option where Indians residing abroad can keep a track on their application online," an NRI applicant requested CARA last week on the same forum.

According to the CARA website, in 2016-2017 there were a total 578 inter-country adoptions and 3,210 domestic adoptions.