Child welfare: Kerala forms guidelines for caretakers

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: For quite long abandoned and orphaned children were handed over to individuals, families or organisations for temporary care in the most irresponsible and non-transparent manner, without checking whether the recipients were ‘fit’ to care for the child. As part of measures to streamline child welfare, the Social Justice Department has come out with the first ever guidelines for the selection of the “fit person” to whom a child can be handed over for temporary care.

Adoption is the only non-institutional or 'outside welfare home' care mechanism that is governed by strict and clear guidelines. But temporary non-institutional mechanisms like individual care or foster care, because it lacks a proper protocol, are open to exploitation by unscrupulous elements. The rules framed for Integrated Child Protection Scheme, though it has innumerable mentions, had not defined “fit person”. Temporary care is an interim arrangement before a child is adopted.

There have been innumerable instances where children handed over to individuals or institutions for temporary care by the district Child Welfare Committee had gone missing from the supposed “fit persons”. The new guidelines state that temporary care of a child should be granted only for six months. Further, it clearly defines a ‘fit person’ in order of priority. Ideally, the fit person should be a close relative of the child. If not, a distant relative.

Only then should parents with married children or families of teachers of the schools in which the child has studied or childless couples should be considered.
And once the child has been given out for temporary care, the social worker or outreach worker should visit the family within the first week. From then on, for the next two months, the worker should visit the home at least once in two weeks. And then for the next three months, at least once in a month.