I met a couple over coffee to answer their questions about adoption in India. During the 2-hour chat, it became painfully clear to me that the husband wanted to adopt but the wife didn’t. He cared about giving a future to a child and was extremely excited about adoption. She…

Few months back, my colleague and I got invited to a ladies’ luncheon to talk about our work in the child protection space. As soon as the talk got over, one lady approached my colleague and jumped into a story about how her nephew was adopted and how it had…

हमारी एक पहचान की आंटी का फ़ोन आया। उनकी बहू के दूसरा बच्चा हुआ था और वो घर में एक आया रखना चाहती थी। यह आंटी पड़ी लिखी हैं और बचपन से मुझे पसंद हैं। मैंने उन्हें एक-दो लोगों के नाम दिए। फिर आंटी धीरे से बोली, “बेटा, हमें छोटी…

Many years ago I mentioned my desire to adopt to a colleague. I didn’t work with her everyday and met her rarely, but she came across as a sensible and kind person, so I felt comfortable sharing my thoughts about adoption. Her reaction surprised me. She told me that adoption…

It happens like clockwork. An advertising company or Bollywood director decides to use Adoption as a trope in their ads or movies. But they depict adoption in such a misguided and callous way that it ends up hurting adoptive families and children. …

I got married in my early twenties, which was too young or just right, depending on who you ask. But one thing that some people seemed to agree on was that my decision to only adopt children and not give birth, would surely result in regret one day. One comment…

Not a day passes without news about a child being thrown in the garbage dump, or illegal adoption rackets hurting children, or children being abused in orphanages and shelters. Did you know, all of this is avoidable? As a society, we judge and shame parents who are incapable or unwilling…

“You should drop off your kids some day,” said a well-meaning acquaintance. She was inviting my kids to play with her kids. I was supposed to leave the kids at her place, then come back a couple of hours later to pick them up. “Yeah maybe,” I hesitated, hoping that…

As a dark-skinned girl growing up in Northern India, my skin colour was an open topic for social commentary. Teachers asked me if I did indeed belong to Haryana/Punjab or did my ancestors migrate from a far off state where apparently all the dark-skinned people lived. Random relatives wondered how…