India, March 17 -- The Supreme Court on Tuesday declared as unconstitutional a legal provision that limited maternity leave for adoptive mothers to only those who adopt children below three months of age.

While holding that, irrespective of the child's age, all adoptive mothers will be entitled to 12 weeks of leave from the date of adoption, the court remarked that the provision was discriminatory both for the mother and child.

"Adoption is an equally meaningful pathway for creating a family.biological factors cannot exclusively determine familial values and entitlements," the SC bench of justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan said.

The SC also urged the Union government to consider introducing paternity leave as a social welfare measur...