Preet Mandir Pune In the Spotlight

UPDATED 10/21/09 to include link to photos on Flickr
submitted by Raisa Sheikh from Pune

' I have come to realize more and more that the greatest disease
and the greatest suffering is to be unwanted, unloved, uncared for,
to be shunned by everybody, to be just nobody (to no one).'
~ Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997)

The last time I visited my sister Jennifer Naidu in Pune, India
she asked my opinion about a large Sign board

that she was making for one of her neighbors, Preet Mandir.
They are a Charitable Home for Orphans, and account for over
7 percent of Adoptions in India. Most of these tiny unfortunates
are malnourished and sickly and so I was really impressed that
my sister was in her own usual, small way helping out. Then I
realized that she too, lived with the same memories I have of
being a near-orphan if not for three Aunts who took us in
( after my Mother passed away, when I was barely five years old )
since my Father was unable to cope with the loss both mentally
and financially.

The reason I brought up those sad fragments of my past is
because tonight LINK TV is repeating 'A Baby Business',
a program that I watched a few weeks ago.

In the program, they mentioned Preet Mandir had been part
of an investigation into charges of 'wrongdoing'
related to the Adoption process. They had been blacklisted by
some adoption agencies in Sweden and the U.S. because the
children were not looked after properly and the fees exorbitant.
Several complaints had been filed against it by parents and
foreign agencies. But that's just one side of the story.

Here's a Quote from the Link TV page:
' Poor families are tricked into giving their children up for adoption.
One of them is an Indian father whose children were taken from
him against his will. When his wife died he temporarily admitted the
children to an orphanage. What he didn’t know was that soon after
his children were adopted by a European family. '

If you are a DISH or DirectTV Network user in the USA, you're in
luck. Others, watch the trailer and follow some of the useful related
links.

Preet Mandir cleared : DNAIndia.com

Goanet June 2006

How YOU can help Orphans