Article
The Best Interest of the Child in Indian Adoption Law: A Socio-Legal Study of the Juvenile Justice Act and International Standards
The doctrine of the best interest of the child occupies the normative core of adoption law worldwide, yet its translation into enforceable legal standards remains uneven across jurisdictions. This paper undertakes a socio-legal examination of how the best interest principle operates within India's adoption framework, anchored in the “Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015”, the “Adoption Regulations, 2022”, and the jurisprudence of Indian courts, read against international benchmarks set by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989 and the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption, 1993. Tracing the doctrinal journey from “Lakshmi Kant Pandey v. Union of India” to recent Supreme Court and High Court pronouncements between 2024 and 2026; including the Court's invocation of Article 142 in “Dasari Anil Kumar v. The Child Welfare Project Director” and the Bombay High Court's validation of the 2021 shift of adoptive authority from courts to District Magistrates; the paper argues that Indian adoption law has moved decisively toward procedural centralization without a commensurate strengthening of the institutional capacity needed to give the best interest standard substantive content. Drawing on comparative insights from the Hague framework and Anglo-American welfare checklists, the paper identifies persistent gaps: uneven functioning of Child Welfare Committees and Specialized Adoption Agencies, restrictive eligibility norms that constrain family diversity, a gendered pattern in relinquishment and adoption, and a rise in informal adoptions that circumvent statutory safeguards. It concludes with recommendations for aligning India's adoption architecture more closely with the substantive, individualized, and accountable application of the best interest principle that international standards contemplate.