In Jaipur a family court has allowed a 64-year-old surrogate father to retain the custody of a six-year-old child. The custody of the child was being claimed by the surrogate mother.
The order was passed on a petition filed by one K K Singh, a 64-year-old entrepreneur who got a child born out of surrogacy in 2006 form a surrogate mother who was his own office staff. The child was born in Mumbai and the child was handed over to him by the surrogate mother. It was given out in the petition filed by Singh that the surrogate mother became greedy and later sought custody of the child.
The surrogate mother approached State Child Rights Commission and also the Child Welfare Committee (CWC). The commission, taking note of the grievance of the surrogate mother, directed that the child be given to her. In order to comply the order of the commission, chairman, CWC, Ram Prakash Bairwa asked the police to get hold of the child and produce his father and the surrogate child on January 16 before the committee.
“We made a written complaint against the misuse of power by the CWC to the additional chief secretary, social justice department as both the commission and the CWC chairman misused their power on the custody of a minor as it can be decided only by a family court or a district judge under the law. The petition was also moved before the family court which has granted a stay order and the custody of the child will now be with father,” said Abhinav Sharma, counsel for petitioner.
The family court judge, Devendra Joshi in his order observed: “The child rights commission and the CWC are entitled to look into the rights of a child who is left stray, or is a runaway child, or a child in need of care and protection but it cannot disturb custody of child who is being brought up well. We, therefore, direct that the chairman, CWC and child rights commission will not undertake any action to disturb the custody of the surrogate child till further orders.”
PTI
