Australians risk losing adopted Indian children

Australians risk losing adopted Indian children

25 Aug, 2008

SYDNEY: Australian couples risk having to give up adopted children whom Indian authorities fear were stolen from their biological parents, Canberra officials said on Monday.

A spokesman for Attorney General Robert McLelland said the adoptive parents of up to 30 Indian children risked having adoptions revoked.

The Liberal Party's Brendan Nelson, leader of the opposition in Parliament, said the government had a "moral responsibility to do the right thing, and the right thing we would expect in most cases will be to look at returning them to their rightful families".

Malaysian Social Services (MSS), a private company licensed by the Indian government, was the intermediary in adoptions by Australian couples.

MSS is under investigation by Indian police, who allege the Chennai-based company paid people to steal children, who were then put up for adoption.

According to a report in Time magazine, as many as 120 children stolen in India may have been adopted by overseas parents.

There is no suggestion that adoptive parents in Australia were aware that the children they took in had been stolen from their biological parents.