India orders all Mother Teresa care homes inspected

NEW DELHI — India has ordered an immediate inspection of all child care homes run by a religious order founded by Mother Teresa after a nun was arrested over an alleged adoption racket. Illegal adoption is big business in India, with over 100,000 children reported missing every year, the government says. Many are given up by desperately poor parents but others are snatched from hospitals and train stations. Police earlier this month arrested the nun and a worker at one of the Missionaries of Charity order’s homes in Ranchi, the capital of eastern Jharkhand state, over allegations that at least five infants were sold for potentially thousands of dollars. The scandal blew up after local child welfare authorities informed police about a newborn missing from the home, which is meant to care for unwed pregnant women and mothers in distress. In a statement late Monday, Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi said all state governments have been asked “to get child care homes run by Missionaries of Charity all over the country inspected immediately.” She also said all child care institutions should be registered and linked to the central adoption authority within the next month. In December India’s Supreme Court had ordered mandatory registration of all child care institutions and bringing orphanages under the central adoption system. Since then some 2,300 child care institutions have been linked to the Central Adoption Resource Authority and about 4,000 are still pending, according to the government. In the aftermath of the adoption scandal, the Missionaries of Charity had said it would carefully look into the Jharkhand case and ensure the incident was never repeated. —