ISSUES ON CHILD LABOUR

ISSUES ON CHILD LABOUR 16/10/2011

Child labor in India is a human right issue for the whole world. It is a serious and extensive problem, with many children under the age of fourteen working in carpet making factories, glass blowing units and making fireworks with bare little hands. According to the statistics given by Indian government there are 20 million child laborers in the country, while other agencies claim that it is 50 million.

As per UNICEF child labor means exceeding the time limit of the work based on conditions like age and the work employed. Work that overshadows these norms is considered to be illegal.

India fully subscribe to this universal aspiration. Our Constitution makers had known that India of their vision would not be a reality if the country’s children are not nurtured and educated. Article 24 dealing with prohibition of employment of children in factories and Article 45 relating to provision of free and compulsory education for children bear testimony to this realization. The other provisions relate to prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labor (Article 23) and certain principles of policy to be followed by the State stipulate that children be secured against exploitation.

Children work for eight hours at a stretch with only a small break for meals. The meals are also frugal and the children are ill nourished. Most of the migrant children who cannot go home, sleep at their work place, which is very bad for their health and development. Seventy five percent of Indian population still resides in rural areas and are very poor. Children in rural families who are ailing with poverty perceive their children as an income generating resource to supplement the family income. Parents sacrifice their children’s education to the growing needs of their younger siblings in such families and view them as wage earners for the entire clan.
Child labor in India is more of a rural than urban phenomenon.

Approximately, 90 per cent of the working children in the rural areas are employed in agriculture and allied activities. The unorganized and informal sectors, both in urban and rural areas, account for almost the entire child labor force. The distribution of child labour in various States appears to indicate certain correlations. States having a larger population living below poverty line have a high incidence of child labour. Similarly, high incidence of child labor is accompanied by high dropout rates in schools. The incidence of child labor is partly linked to the level of socio-economic development of an area and partly to the attitude and approach of parents of the child laborers as a result of socio-economic compulsions. According to the 1991 census, the number of working children in the country was11.28 million.

Children with an age limit of five to eleven years are eligible to work for one hour on wages and for 28 per week of domestic work. All those ranging between 12 to 14 years of age can work only for fourteen hours per week on paid basis. Children with 15 to 17 years of age are allowed to work for forty three hours a week. One out of six children is engaged in child labour. In India as per the statistics by the government and other agencies it varies from 20 million to 50 million. It is more dominant in northern India.

The Ministry of Labor has considered these problems of child labour. It recognizes the need to protect child labor from being forced to work in hazardous conditions that endanger their physical and mental development. It addressed the need to ensure the health and safety of children at the work place recognizing that they must be protected from excessively long working hours. All working children should be provided with sufficient weekly rest periods and holidays.

Apart from the Child Labor (Prohibition & Regulation) Act, 1986, there are legal provisions for working children in other laws such as the Factories Act, 1948, the Mines Act, 1952, the Motor Transport Worker’s Act, 1961, the Beedi and Cigar Workers (Conditions of Employment) Act, 1966, the Plantations Labor Act, 1951 and the Minimum Wages Act, 1948. The Child Labour Act prohibits employment of children (under 14 yrs) in 13 occupations and 57 processes contained in Part A & B of the schedule to the Act. It also lays down penalties for employment of children in violation of the provisions of this Act and regulates the employment of children with respect to working hours, number of holidays, health and safety in work place.

Where children are forced to work at low wages and parents lose their child for the younger sibling. Innumerable laws have made to stop child labour which includes Indian constitution law of 1986 making it a crime and children below the fourteen years of age prohibited from working. In Kenya the age limit is sixteen years of age which excludes agriculture and domestic work separated from the child labor.

The main concern is with the children working in harmful and hazardous places such as tobacco, chemical, mines and glass factories. Sometimes they have to work day and night keeping themselves confined within the boundary walls. What is outside world like? They have no clues to it! Apart from all this one can easily see them working in households as servants. Cleaning and coping with the domestic work in the house where so called educated and literate people reside. We all need to be aware and raise a voice where ever you see child labor happening be it your college canteen or neighborhood. One voice raised alone can lead to many changes.

These children belong to the slums and poor households be it urban or rural areas. They are supposed to share the financial burden along their parents to run their livelihood. A number of children are often accused of exploitation in all modes. The weaker sex that is girl child are more prone to abuse and exploitation. Behind the term child labor they not only lose their childhood but also the basic and higher education. All the moral, mental and physical development gets hampered. Almost everyone is against the child labor even those who practice this!

Primary education is one of the important responsibilities to be discharged by Municipalities under the Orissa Primary Education Act. Again, to state the reality, even after sixty years after the promulgation of the Constitution, we have not been able to attain full literacy. Of all the different areas of education, primary education is suffering the most. When the Constitution was promulgated, a Directive Principle was laid down in Article 45 which states that the State shall endeavor to provide, within the period of ten years from the commencement of the Constitution, for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of fourteen years. This has not been achieved yet. The 86th Amendment to the Constitution effected in the year 2002 deleted this Article 45, and substitut ed it with new Article 45 which lays down that the State shall endeavour to provide early childhood care and education for all children until they complete the age of six years. The amendment has made Right to Education a Fundamental Right under Article 21A. This Article lays down that the State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of six to fourteen years in such manner as the State may, by law, determine. In the year 2009 we passed the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009. All these laws have however not been implemented with the spirit with which they ought to have been. We have several national initiatives in operation such as the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, District Primary Education Programme, and the Universal Elementary Education Programme to name a few. However, the statistical data shows that we are still far away from achieving the goal of full literacy.


Nobel laureate Shri Amartya Sen commented on our tardy progress in the field of basic education in his Article `The Urgency of Basic Education' in the seminar Right to Education-Actions Now held at New Delhi on 19.12.2007 as follows:-
“India has been especially disadvantaged in basic education, and this is one of our major challenges today. When the British left their Indian empire, only 12 per cent of the India population was literate. That was terrible enough, but our progress since independence has also been quite slow. This contrasts with our rapid political development into the first developing country in the world to have a functioning democracy.”





If this is put to an end it might increase further the poverty situation. The wages they are getting out the work is serving their basic needs. If something is wrong is then it is the exceeding and exploitation of laws made for protecting the child from exploitation. Out of cheap labor rates people opt for small children to work for them. A time out of poor family condition they are forced to work. Child trafficking has also added to the child labor.

There are many black sheep’s in the society because of whom the laws are not implemented the way they should have been. Furthermore the ignorant and illiterate parents who are unaware of the consequences of child labor. Day by day rising economic needs and growing population adds more to it. If we actually want to stop the child labor we need to implement all law properly.

“ In spite of the various campaigns by government sensitizing the public on the booming child labor problem in India, the problem is still seeing an upswing. According to a report by an NGO, there were an estimated 6 crore child laborers in the country. If that was not all, approximately Rs 1.2 lakh crore is generated as black money through child labor every year in India.

The report presented by an NGO, Bachpan Bachao Andolan stated government estimates claiming that Rs 15 is spent on a child laborers per day with the equivalent cost of an adult worker is Rs 115 per day according to the National floor wage. Bhuwan Ribhu, a lawyer with the NGO commented, “That is a difference of Rs 100 per labourer. With the average number of working days in a year being about 200, the employers profit by Rs 1.2 lakh crore by employing child labour." (Courtesy New.oneindia.in)”.

The basic free education should be made compulsory and we need to insure it again and again. Right to education should become an actual right. We cannot let the futures of nation- the children fighting and struggling with society merely for their lives.
The Government is determined to eliminate all forms of child labour by 2020. Indeed, poverty eradication combined with educational reforms to provide free or affordable access to quality education with an interesting, innovative and job-oriented curriculum for all can effectively eliminate child labour once and for all.

There are 5 lakh formal schools for a population of 239 million; 14% have no school building; 38% have no blackboards; 30% have only one teacher for the whole school; 58% have no drinking water. The result 4 out of 5 children don t even enters a school and 70% of children drop out before they enter Class IV.

If we cannot take big steps let’s start with the small ones. This is the drastic change we need to join hands together for. Say no to child labor.

SIDDHARTHA SHANKAR MISHRA,
BUREAU CHIEF, THESE DAYS, TASVER E HIND
ORISSA, SAMBALPUR