The Story continues . . .

As far as the process is concerned, our paperwork is currently at the Indian Agency called CARA, they need to issue an NOC or No Objection Certificate. This NOC basically states that they are approving that particular child to be adopted into that particular family. These were happening very quickly but slowed down for no apparent reason last month. Or in our case, to approve sweet Jaya to become a Cooper! The average wait for that is about 2 – 4 months and they have had our paperwork for 1 month already.

We should hear news on this shortly!

Once the NOC is received (this is a HUGE step by the way) then our paperwork makes it’s way back to Calcutta to go before the judge. The term for this portion of the process is called “Getting the Legals signed”. This is where the problem has been over the past 6 months. Apparently, a new judge came in and had a very negative view on adoption and has not sign ANY legals for 6 months (Domestic or International). This has caused a backlog of families, 11 from our agency alone - who have been stuck waiting. After much prayer this week, we found out that he has started signing them and will hopefully get to all 11 next week. This is great news for all those families and for us because it means that there will be no backlog when our Legals go before him.

So all in all, it’s pretty good news. We also went to Pittsburgh last weekend to have our fingerprints updated so hopefully we are a little ahead of the game. If we had to estimate, we hope to be travelling in Jan or Feb 2006.