SC Examines The Applicability Of L K Pandey Case To Adoption Under Personal Laws

Facts of the case

• In this case, a 2-year-old girl was given up for adoption by her biological mother to a couple by executing a notarized document without complying with the Juvenile Justice Act.
• The adoptive parents moved to the Supreme Court against the order passed by the Bombay High Court. The Bombay High Court refused to permit the adoptive parents to take custody of the child on the basis that they had just executed a notarized document.
• The petitioner-¬couple claimed that the girl’s biological mother had given the child to them willingly. They had filed a writ petition of Habeas Corpus in the High Court after the child was taken away by the CWC and placed in Child Care Institution.
• The petitioner-¬couple also claimed that the requirements for valid adoption under the Hindu Adoption Act were carried out and sought protection under Section 56(3) of the JJ Act which provides that nothing in the Act shall apply to the adoption of children done under the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act of 1956.
• The couple claimed that the JJ Act cannot be applied to their case and the entire proceedings before the CWC were not as per the law and the CWC had no jurisdiction to take the child away.
• However, the High Court held that the notarized document nowhere held that the adoption was done according to the provisions of the Hindu Adoption Act and held that the girl was a child in need of care and protection and the CWC had acted as per the mandate of the law.

Before the Supreme Court

• Before the Supreme Court, the couple submitted that both the parties are governed by Hindu law and the child was adopted as per the provisions of the Hindu Adoption Act and the adoption process was done by performing the ‘Dattak’ religious ceremony in presence of witnesses and executing a deed of adoption.
• Justice Ramasubramanian observed that as held in Anokha vs. State of Rajasthan, L.K. Pandey guidelines do not apply to private adoptions where the child was given in adoption by biological parents.
• The L.K. Pandey vs. Union of India laid down an entire scheme for regulating inter¬-country and intra-¬country adoptions. In Anokha vs. the State of Rajasthan, it was held that procedural safeguards do not have to be stressed in cases of adoption of children living with their biological parents because the natural parents are the best judge of what is in the interest of the child.
• In its orders, the Court directed that the custody of the child is handed over to the petitioner-couple and that adoption under a personal law will not be governed by the guidelines laid down in L.K. Pandey vs. Union of India.
• The Bench also observed that the biological mother has no objection if the custody of the child is given to the petitioner-¬couple.

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