ADOPTION OF CHILDREN

(1) Any person desirous of being authorized to adopt a child may make application to the court in the manner provided by rules made under section 13, and upon such application being made, the court may, subject to the provisions of this Part, make an order (hereinafter referred to as an “adoption order”) authorizing that person to adopt the child.

(2) No adoption order shall be made authorizing two or more persons to adopt a child:

Provided, however, that the court may, on application made in that behalf by two spouses jointly, make an adoption order authorizing the two spouses jointly to adopt a child.

(1) An adoption order shall not be made in any case where-

Provided, however, that where the child in respect of whom an application is made is –

the court may, if it thinks fit make an adoption order, notwithstanding that the applicant is less than twenty-one years older than the child.

(2) An adoption order shall not be made in any case where the sole applicant is a male and the child in respect of whom the application is made is a female, unless the court is satisfied that there are special circumstances which justify the making of an adoption order.

(3) An adoption order shall not be made except with the consent of every person or body who is a parent or guardian of the child in respect of whom the application is made, or who has the actual custody of the child, or who is liable to contribute to the support of the child:

Provided that the court may dispense with any consent required by the preceding provisions of this subsection if satisfied that the person whose consent is to be dispensed with has abandoned or deserted the child or cannot be found or has been adjudged by a competent court to be of unsound mind, or, being a person liable to contribute to the support of the child, either has persistently neglected or refused to contribute to such support or is a person whose consent ought, in the opinion of the court and in all the circumstances of the case, to be dispensed with.

A man who marries a woman having a child (whether legitimate or illegitimate) at the time of the marriage shall be deemed for the purposes of this subsection to be a person liable to contribute to the support of the child.

(4) An adoption order shall not be made upon the application of one of two spouses without the consent of the other of them:

Provided that the court may dispense with any consent required by the preceding provisions of this subsection if satisfied that the person whose consent is to be dispensed with cannot be found or has been adjudged by a competent court to be of unsound mind, or that the spouses have been judicially separated by a decree of a competent court.

(5) An adoption order shall not be made in respect of a child over the age of ten years except with the consent of such child.

(6) An adoption order shall not be made in favour of any applicant who is not resident and domiciled in Ceylon or in respect of any child who is not so resident:

(a) that every person whose consent is necessary under this Part and whose consent is not dispensed with has consented to, and understands the nature and effect of, the adoption order for which application is made, and in particular in the case of any parent, understands that the effect of the adoption order will be permanently to deprive him or her of his or her parental rights; and

(b) that the order, if made, will be for the welfare of the child, due consideration being for this purpose given to the wishes of the child, having regard to the age and understanding of the child; and

(c) that the applicant has not received, or agreed to receive, and the no person has made or given or agreed to make or given to the applicant, any payment or other reward in considerations of the adoption except such as the court may sanction.

(1) Upon an adoption order being made, all rights, duties, obligations and liabilities of the parent or parents, guardian or guardians of the adopted child in relation to the future custody, maintenance and education of the adopted child including all rights to appoint a guardian or to consent to the marriage of the child, or to give notice forbidding the issue of a certificate for the solemnization of such marriage shall be extinguished; and all such rights, duties, obligations and liabilities shall vest in and be exercisable by and enforceable against the adopter as though the adopted child was a child born to the adopter in lawful wedlock, and in respect of the same matters and in respect of the liability of a child to maintain its parents the adopted child shall stand to the adopter exclusively in the position of a child born to the adopter in lawful wedlock:

Provided that in any case where two spouses are the adopters such spouses shall, in respect of the matters aforesaid and for the purpose of the jurisdiction of any court to make orders as to the custody and maintenance of and right of access to children, stand to each other and to the adopted child in the same relation as they would have stood, if they had been the lawful father and mother of the adopted child, and the adopted child shall stand to them respectively in the same relation as a child have stood to a lawful father and mother respectively.

(2) The court which makes an adoption order in respect of any child shall, unless in its discretion it considers it inexpedient so to do, by that order confer on the child the surname or family name of the adopter or such other name as would, having regard to the customs of the community to which the adopter belongs, be conferred on a child born in lawful wedlock of the adopter.

(3) Upon an adoption order being made, the adopted child shall for all purposes whatsoever be deemed in law to be the child born in lawful wedlock of the adopter:

Provided, however, that unless the contrary intention clearly appears from any instrument (whether such instrument takes effect inter vivos or mortis causa), such adopted child shall not by such adoption –

(4) An adoption order shall not deprive the adopted child of any right to or interest in any property to which, but for the order, the child would have been entitled under any intestacy or disposition whether occurring or made before or after the date of the adoption order.

(5) Upon the death intestate of any person in respect of whom an adoption order has been made, neither the adopter nor any person claiming through or under him shall, by reason of the adoption, acquire any right to succeed to the estate or any part of the estate of the person adopted:

Provided, however, that where any part of the estate consists of immovable property which had accrued to or devolved on the adopted person by reason of his having been deemed in law to be the child born in lawful wedlock of the adopter, or which had been transferred to him by way of gift by the adopter or by any ascendant or descendant or brother or sister of the adopter, the adopter and persons claiming under him shall, notwithstanding anything in any written or other law to the contrary, be entitled to succeed to that immovable property in like manner as though the person adopted were the child born in lawful wedlock of the adopter.

(1) Upon any application for an adoption order the court may postpone the determination of the application and may make an interim order (which shall not be an adoption order for the purposes of this Part) giving the custody of the child to the applicant for a period not exceeding two years by way of a probationary period upon such terms as regards provision for the maintenance and education and supervision of the welfare of the child and otherwise as the court may think fit.

(2) All such consents as are required to an adoption order shall be necessary to an interim order, but subject to a like power on the part of the court to dispense with any such consent.

(1) The Registrar-General shall establish and maintain at his office a register to be called the Adoption Register, together with an index thereof, and shall make or cause to be made in that register such entries as may be directed to be made therein by adoption orders.

(2) The court which makes any adoption order shall in that order direct the Registrar-General to make in the Adoption Register an entry recording the adoption in the form set out in the Schedule to this Ordinance.

(3) Where, upon any application for an adoption order in respect of any child, the dale of the birth of that child and the identity of that child with a child to whom any entry or entries in any register of births kept under the Births and Deaths Registration Act relates, is proved to the satisfaction of the court, the court shall if the adoption order is made, in that order direct the Registrar-General –

(4) Every court which makes an adoption order shall cause the adoption order to be communicated to the Registrar-General, and upon receipt of such communication the Registrar-General shall cause compliance to be made with the directions contained in such order in regard both to marking any entry in the registers of births with the word “Adopted” and in regard to making the appropriate entry in the Adoption Register.

(5) The Registrar-General shall not cause or permit to be made in the adopyion register other than an entry which is, by an adoption order, directed to be made therein:

Provided, however, that-

(6) A certified copy of any entry in the Adoption Register if purporting to be made under the hand of the Registrar-General or any Assistant Registrar-General shall –

(1) The court having jurisdiction to make an adoption order under his Part shall be the Court of Requests having jurisdiction in the place at which the applicant, or the child in respect of whom the application is made, resides.

(2) It shall be lawful for the Judges of the Supreme Court or any five of them, of the whom the Chief Justice shall be one, to make rules prescribing the manner in which the application to the court or to be made and the procedure to be followed in the hearing of such applications, and providing for all matters connected with or incidental to the matters aforesaid.

Such rules may provide for applications for adoption orders being heard and determined otherwise than in open court.

(3) The matters for which rules may be made under subsection (2) shall be deemed to be added to the list of matters in respect of which rules made under section 49 of the Court Ordinance; and the provisions of section 49 and 50 of the Ordinance. shall apply accordingly in the case of any rule made in respect of any of the matters reffered to in subsection (2).

(4) For the purpose of any application under this Part, the court shall, subject to any rules made under this section, appoint some person or body of persons to act as guardian ad litem of the child upon the hearing of the application with the duty of safeguarding the interests of the child before the court.

(5) For the purposes of the Civil Procedure Code and of the Stamp Ordinance and an application to the court for an adoption order shall be deemed to be an action of the value of one hundred rupees:

Provided, however, that no stamp duty shall be chargeable in respect of any such application.

(1) Save as otherwise provided in section 29, no person who on the appointed date has in his care, custody or control any child of whom he is not the natural parent, shall continue to keep the child in his care, custody or control after the expiry of a period of three months from that date unless he gives notice in the prescribed form to an authorized officer to the effect that the child is in his custody.

(2) An authorized officer shall, on receipt of a notice under subsection (1) from any person, transmit the notice to the Government Agent of the District in which that person is resident; and the Government Agent shall thereupon register that person as the custodian of the child and deliver to him a certificate of registration in the prescribed form.

(3) Nothing in the preceding provisions of this section shall be deemed to prejudice the power of a Government Agent to register any person under subsection (2) as the custodian of a child, notwithstanding that the notice given by that person under subsection (1) is received after the expiry of the period mentioned in that subsection.

(4) In this section, “authorized officer” includes any police officer for the time being in charge of a police station, and any Registrar appointed under the Births and Deaths Registration Act or the Marriage Registration Ordinance.

(1) Save as otherwise provided in section 29, no person shall on or after the appointed date, take or receive into his care, custody or control any child of whom he is not the natural parent, unless he has been registered by an authorized officer as the custodian of that child.

(2) An authorized officer shall not register any person under this section as the custodian of any child –

Provided, however, that an authorized officer may dispense with the consent of any person whose consent is required under paragraph (c), if the officer is satisfied that the person whose consent is to be dispensed with is dead or cannot be found, or has abandoned, deserted or neglected the child, or has been adjudged by a competent court to be of unsound mind.

(3) An authorized officer shall, upon the registration by him of any person as the custodian of a child, issue to that person a certificate of registration in the prescribed form, and transmit a copy of the certificate to the Government Agent of the District in which that person is resident.

(a) to provide adequate food, clothing and medical attention for the protected person;

(b) as soon as may be after the protected person is taken into his care, custody or control or attains the age of twelve years (whichever of these events is the later) to open an account at the Ceylon Post Office Savings Bank in his own name as trustee for the protected person as beneficiary, and, until the protected person attains the age of eighteen years, to deposit each month to the credit of that account, an amount determined in accordance with such scales as may be prescribed;

(c) at the end of each successive period of six months after the aforesaid account is opened, to send for purposes of inspection to the Government Agent of the District in which he is resident the deposit book issued by the bank in respect of that account;

(d) to furnish to the Government Agent of the District in which he is resident such returns and information, relating to the protected person, as the Government Agent of the District may from time to time require him to furnish.

(a) in the caption or title of the account opened for the benefit of a protected person under section 21, the description “a protected person” shall be added immediately after his name; and

(b) no part of the amounts deposited to the credit of such account shall be, or be permitted by the bank to be, withdrawn, until the protected person attains the age of eighteen years.

(a) from time to time to visit and examine any protected person and to make such inquiries as may be necessary relating to the treatment and welfare of the protected person; and

(b) for the purpose of any such visit, examination or inquiry, to enter and inspect at any reasonable time during the day, any premises in which the protected person is for the time being resident or employed.

(1) Any person who –

shall be guilty of an offence, and shall, on conviction after summary trial before a Magistrate, be liable to a fine not exceeding five hundred rupees or to imprisonment of either description for a term not exceeding three months or to both such fine and imprisonment.

(2) Where any person is convicted of the offence of having failed or refused to deposit the appropriate amount to the credit of any account opened by him in accordance with the requirements of paragraph (b) of section 21, the Magistrate may, without prejudice to any punishment which may be imposed for the offence, direct that amount to be recovered from that person in like manner as a fine and when so recovered to be deposited to the credit of that account.

(1) The Minister[1] may make regulations for or in respect of any matter stated or required in this Part to be prescribed, or for which regulations are required or authorized to be made under this Part, and generally for the purpose of carrying out or giving effect to the principles and provisions of this Part.

(2) Every regulation shall be published in the Gazette and shall come into operation upon such publication.

(3) Every regulation shall, as soon as may be after the date of the publication thereof in the Gazette, be brought before the Senate and the House of Representatives[1] by a motion that such regulation be approved.

(4) Every regulation which is by the Senate and the House of Representatives[1] shall, upon the notification in the Gazette of such approval, be as valid and effectual as though it were herein enacted.

(5) Any regulation which the Senate and the House of Representatives[1] refuses to approve shall be deemed to be rescinded with effect from the date of such refusal, but without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done or suffered to be done thereunder. Notification of the date on which any such regulation is deemed to be rescinded shall be published in the Gazette.

(6) The provisions of section 7 of the Interpretation Ordinance shall apply in relation to the power to make regulations under this section in like manner as they apply in the case of the power to make rules or issue orders under any enactment.

(1) Nothing in this Part shall apply in any case where a child is in, or is taken or received into, the care, custody or control of any person –

(2) In this section, “relative” when used with reference to a legitimate child, means a grandparent, brother, aunt, sister, uncle, aunt, or child of an uncle or aunt, by consanguinity or affinity; and when used with refference legitimate child, means any person who would be so related to the child if the child were legitimate.