Vietnam may relocate orphans, elderly from Hanoi pagoda after infant trading scandal

Dang Van Bat, deputy director of the department, said his agency has worked out two options to handle the number of abandoned and orphaned children who are staying at Bo De Pagoda under the support of the pagoda and its patrons.

The Hanoi People’s Committee will decide on which option will be chosen, Bat said.

These options are offered while an inspection team is checking all activities related to receiving, bringing up, and taking care of abandoned or orphaned children at Bo De following the arrest of two women for trading a boy from the pagoda for US$1,650.

One of the options is to grant the pagoda, whose abbot is nun Thich Dam Lan, a license for setting up a social sponsoring center on its premises so that it can continue receiving and caring for disadvantaged children and old people, the deputy director said.

Over the past several years, the pagoda has doubled as a social sponsoring center for children and elderly people but it has yet to obtain any permit to do so, he added.    

The other option is that the pagoda will be required to stop receiving and caring for children and the department will transfer all of them to public social sponsoring centers in the capital city.

It is unlikely for authorities to choose to issue a license to Bo De, Bat said, explaining that the pagoda is found failing to meet necessary standards for supporting 106 children and 39 elderly people currently residing there.

The department has asked five state-owned charitable organizations to be ready for taking over these needy children and elderly people from the pagoda. 

These entities including Social Sponsoring Centers 1, 2 and 3, the Center for Elderly People and Handicapped Children, and the Center for Social Labor and Education 2, the official said.

Regarding the children trading at Bo De, Hanoi police on August 3 arrested Pham Thi Nguyet, 35, of Hoang Mai District, and Nguyen Thi Thanh Trang, 37, the former caretaker of children at the pagoda.

Nguyet was found buying an 8-month-old boy, named Cu Nguyen Cong, for VND35 million ($1,650) from Trang on January 1 this year. 

After the trade, Nguyet renamed him Pham Gia Bao, who died on June 27 after contracting measles.

Police are continuing their investigation to determine how many children have been traded or given away from the pagoda and whether the nun Thich Dam Lan was involved in the purported trade.