An Indian couple have had their children taken away by Norwegian social workers because they were feeding them with their hands and sleeping in the same bed as them.
Anurup and Sagarika Bhattacharya lost custody of their three-year-old son and one-year-old daughter eight months ago after authorities branded their behaviour inappropriate.
The drastic measure led to intervention from the Indian government who contacted Norwegian authorities in an a desperate attempt to return the children.
Norwegian Child Protection Services removed the youngsters from their home in May, 2011, leaving their parents horrified with the outcome of the report.
Father Anurup told Indian television channel NDTV: ‘They told me ”why are you sleeping with the children in the same bed?’’.
‘(I told them) this is also a purely cultural issue. We never leave the children in another room and say goodnight to them.’
Anurup added: ‘Feeding a child with the hand is normal in Indian tradition and when the mother is feeding with a spoon there could be phases when she was overfeeding the child.
‘They said it was force feeding. These are basically cultural differences.’
Mrs Bhattacharya said: ‘My son was sleeping with my husband. They said he should sleep separately from your son.’
The parents have been told that they can only see their children twice a year, for an hour during each visit until the kids turn 18 when they will no longer be bound by the current restrictions under current Norwegian law.
Despite the Indian government’s intervention, Norwegian officials are refusing to meet the request for any further explanation.
The Norwegian government has taken these people’s children and now will not allow them to see each other, over simple xenophobia. Absolutely tragic.
what the fuck?
YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME.
Wow.
I just want to add that this shit is NORMAL and happens in other Western countries. Brown & Black parents in the U.S. that want to give birth at home are forced to give birth in the hospital under threat of losing all their children. Co-sleeping is so frowned on that community health nurses are telling parents that it is “abuse” and requiring to see that parents have a crib set up. I am seeing so many examples of the government, medical establishment, & social workers getting into the middle of people’s choices for how they birth/raise their children that it is truly frightening. And the frequency with which this is turned upon dirt poor white people and POC - especially when we are talking about practices that are normal in our cultures - is downright common.
Am I the only one wondering how light these kids are & how cute? Because given the agency’s justification that the 4 month old doesn’t look at Mom so there’s a lack of emotional attachment, I’m thinking of all the “rescued brown child & gave to a nice white family” adoption stories.
this story is making me fucking sick. two hours a year? i want to throw up.
(via so-treu)
