German man’s plea to trace Indian mother dismissed

NEW DELHI - The Supreme Court Monday dismissed a suit filed by a 37-year-old German man of Indian origin seeking the whereabouts of his biological mother and claiming genetic link with the brother of Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar.

“You don’t even know the identity of your mother. How can you find her through a writ petition? Unless you know your mother, how can you say that she is in illegal detention?” an apex court bench of Justice Markandey Katju and Justice T.S. Thakur told Arun Dohle.

The court said that in the given circumstances, there was no merit in the habeas corpus petiton and dismissed his plea seeking to establish a genetic link with Pratap Pawar, brother of Sharad Pawar, or their family.

However, this was not before the court permitted senior counsel Shekhar Naphade to peruse the records of the Kusumbai Motichand Mahila Seva Gram (KMMSG) where Dohle was allegedly abandoned by his biological mother after his birth in 1973.

When counsel Neela Gokhale appearing for the KMMSG opposed it, the court said: “No national secret is involved in it and the days of privileged documents are over.”

The court showed the record to Naphade after he pleaded that the biological mother of the petitioner could be traced only if the records were made available to them.

The court had earlier wondered how the unwed mother of Dohle could be traced 37 years after his birth.

The court pointed out that there was a tendency among unwed mothers to give their factitious name to orphanage officials. At that time, those manning the orphanage don’t verify the identity and address of the abandoned child’s mother.

Another counsel argued that a child’s rights over his biological mother were terminated after the child was given away in adoption.

When Justice Thakur asked the KMMSG if it maintained any register, counsel Gokhale said that they had a system of maintaining the case files but had no separate registers.

After perusing the file, Naphade said there was something fishy about the whole thing.

Dohle was born July 31, 1973 at Pune’s Sessoon Hospital and was abandoned at the city-based KMMSG.

Four weeks later, Dohle was adopted by German couple Michael and Gertrude Dohle. Dohle, however, claimed he was forcibly taken away from his mother by the KMMSG - an institution for destitute women - and given away to the German couple.

The Maharashtra government, which was asked to look into the matter, has told the Supreme Court that there was no truth in Dohle’s claim that he was related to the Pawars.