Covid19 has put on hold a special union, one that would have gifted a Spanish couple the joy of becoming parents through adoption of a four year old girl from a home in the district.

Bankura district judge Apurba Sinha Roy, the legal guardian of the child by virtue of his official post, held a hearing through videoconferencing on Thursday on the adoption and decided to complete the process once the situation normalised both in India and Spain.

The couple joined the videoconferencing from Spain. Judge, Sinha Roy, along with interpreter Arumita Mukherjee, conducted the proceedings at Bankura district court.

Sources said the videoconference hearing was needed as the Spaniards couldn’t leave for India because of cancellation of international flights in the wake of the pandemic.

The sources said Thursday’s videoconferencing was the first of its kind adoption hearing in Bankura. They added that the court had asked the couple about the pandemic in Spain. The duo, who worked at a private company in Spain, told the judge that they lived in the green zone and the situation in their locality had improved. It has improved enough for the “government to issue them work passes to join office from Monday”, the couple said.

The judge withheld the final process of the adoption and asked the couple to wait till the situation improved.

The sources said the couple, too, had agreed to wait before taking the child to Spain because of the pandemic and logistic reasons as international flights were not operating from India. The couple will have to appear in the court for final hearing to complete the adoption process.

The sources said the child was an inmate of a home run by Chamtagora Adibashi Mahila Samiti, an NGO in Chhatna block of Bankura.

The Spanish couple had applied online to the authorised foreign adoption agency in India in 2019 and it was subsequently forwarded to the Central Adoption Resource Authority.

After coordination and scanning with all district level authorised special adoption agencies in the country and running a background and financial status check of the couple in Spain, the duo were given the go ahead to adopt the four year old girl.

The Child Welfare Committee and the authorised special adoption agency in Bankura studied the couple’s application and gave its report to the district judge for hearing after scrutinising the financial and social status of the couple.