President Barack Obama’s diplomatic mission to India over the weekend will no doubt engender much good will between the United States and the world’s emerging economic giant. But it will likely ignore a pressing issue with human and moral dimensions: the abduction of U.S. children to India.

With the exception of Mexico, the United States has more open cases of parental child abduction to India than any other country in the world, according to the U.S. State Department.

And those numbers are rising, as the State Department is working on more than 100 cases concerning children abducted to India. Overall, there has been a more than 160 percent jump in the number of parental child abduction cases from the United States to other countries in the past decade.

India is widely perceived to be a “safe haven” for international parental child abduction. Much to the chagrin of the U.S. and other Western nations, India has resisted ratifying the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, which has about 80 signatories that enable prompt return of abducted children back to their homes.

To make matters worse, Indian courts do not recognize U.S. court orders for enforcement, even though the U.S. courts respect foreign orders — including from India — that are in accordance with U.S. and international laws.

Instead, Indian courts give themselves jurisdiction to hear cases afresh, even if the divorcing couples and children are U.S. citizens and had never resided in India. With roughly 30 million cases pending before Indian courts, the delays give the abducting parent time to create facts to argue that the American child is settled in India. Moreover, many left-behind parents have little recourse to defend themselves from false and frivolous lawsuits in India when they go to reclaim their American kids.

The U.S. State Department website issues a chilling warning: “Once a child has been abducted to India, remedies are very few.” It further states that Indian courts “exert their own jurisdiction in rulings that tend to favor the parent who wants to keep the child in India.” This rewards the bad behavior of the abducting parent.

According to the State Department, more parents abduct their kids to and from the United States than any other country. Why aren’t we doing more? A collective resolve from the government, courts and the media will go a long way in redressing this malaise.

Experts agree that the best option for an international parental abduction is prevention.

Unfortunately, the judiciary, especially the trial courts, have yet to realize the gravity of this issue. If there is a risk of a parent abducting a child to a country like India, which is not a signatory to the Hague Conventions, courts should err on the side of caution by restricting international travel and/or ordering the surrender of the child’s passport. Many abductions to India could have been prevented if the courts had taken a harder stance against travel to India with the child.

Unlike many countries, the United States does not have passport exit controls to tag and prevent an abduction. The State Department should work with Congress to put in a system that can prevent travel through international airports. It should also apply pressure on the Indian government to ratify the Hague Conventions.

Members of the U.S. Congress should work on laws that will deter parental child abductions, besides assisting left-behind parents on their mission to bring back the kids home.

Our strength and identity as a nation depends on how well we can take care of our most vulnerable children. We have lots of work to do in this area.

Rex Arul, a native of India, lives in Smyrna and is an energy consultant.