Petition of the New England Home for Little Wanderers

The New England Home for Little Wanderers (Home), which had had custody of the unmarried mothers child from about the time of its birth ten months previously, filed a petition in the Probate *632Court for Suffolk County on April 23, 1973, to dispense with the need for the mother’s consent to a subsequent adoption of the child. The petition was under G. L. c. 210, § 3, as amended through St. 1972, c. 800, § 2. Subsections (b) and (c) of § 3 allow a licensed child care agency to commence such a proceeding with regard to any child in its “care or custody”; the court is to approve the petition if it…