New Delhi: Women who adopt children older than three months will now be entitled to maternity leave, the Supreme Court has held.
The Court, on Tuesday, declared as unconstitutional a key provision in the Code on Social Security, 2020, that restricted maternity leave for adoptive mothers to those adopting children below three months of age.
All adoptive mothers will be entitled to 12 weeks of leave from the date of adoption, irrespective of the child’s age, the bench of Justice J B Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan ruled.
The age-based classification under Section 60(4) of the Code was “discriminatory” and violative of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution, the Court observed, emphasising that adoption is an equally valid pathway to parenthood and cannot be treated differently from biological childbirth.
The bench also urged the Union government to consider introducing paternity leave as a social welfare measure, signalling the need for a more gender-neutral and inclusive approach to caregiving, as reported by Hindustan Times.
Justice Pardiwala delivered the judgement and said the provision failed the test of constitutional scrutiny as it bore no rational nexus with the object of maternity protection, which is to ensure care, bonding and integration of the child into the family.
“The impugned provision is held to be discriminatory both for the adoptive mother as well as the adoptive child. Adoption is an equally meaningful pathway for creating a family…biological factors cannot exclusively determine familial values and entitlements,” the court said.
The statutory benefit of 12 weeks’ maternity leave must apply equally to adoptive and commissioning mothers, beginning from the date of adoption, without any age restriction on the child, the Court held.
“A mother cannot be differentiated between one who brings home a child less than three months and one who adopts a child of a higher age,” the Court held.
It added that the right to reproductive autonomy is not confined to biological birth, expanding the Constitutional understanding of parenthood to include adoption.
Older children, particularly those adopted from institutional care, often require greater time for emotional adjustment and integration into a new family, the Court noted, placing significant emphasis on the best interests of the child,
“The paramount consideration has to be the best interest of the child…including the period required for the child to integrate into the new family,” the bench said.
