CHILD LABOUR
REDUCING INDIA’S CHILD LABOUR FORCE
With the highest figure in the world for child labour, the Indian government is working on ways to tackle the problem. However, other factors are contributing to the situation, argues a Member of India’s lower House, the Lok Sabha.
Shri Kalyan Banerjee, MP, in NewDelhi. Shri Banerjee has been an All India Trinamool Congress Member of the Lok Sabha, India’s lower House, since 2009. A lawyer, he was a Member of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly from 2001 to 2006.
Shri Kalyan Banerjee, MP
“Children are living beings – more living than grown-up people who built shells of habit around themselves. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary for their mental health and development that they should not have mere school for their lessons, but the world whose guiding spirit is personal love” Rabindra Nath Tagore
Every child is a blessing of God, representing the greatest assets of a nation and the future of every country. It is unfortunate therefore when a child becomes a labourer under our prevailing social system. Every nation believes that employers should not be
118 | The Parliamentarian | 2013: Issue Two
permitted to employ children and that parents, no matter how poor, should not be allowed to keep children out of school. It is up to the state to stand as guardian, protecting children against child labour. In India a large number of children work for free in the fields or the cottages with their parents, where plucking leaves from the tea garden is all too common. For poorer countries, children are an economic asset. India is the world’s largest democratic country, and the world’s second fastest growing major economy, but millions of children – all under 14 years of age – work as labourers. It has the world’s largest child labour force at 2.3 per cent. Poverty as well as the lack of educational facilities has contributed to the figure. A recent report produced by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions says that there were as many as 4.98 million children working in India’s agricultural, industrial and commercial sectors. India’s booming economy has taken advantage of children workers towards its growth. While child labourers can be found in urban dwellings, around 80 per cent
reside in rural areas where they are forced to work in agricultural activities, such as tanning, livestock rearing, forestry and fisheries. The practice is widely prevalent in many third world countries such as China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Brazil, but the matter is of greater concern in India given it has the largest in the world.
Tackling the issue
After independence, the Indian constitution adopted proactive policies in trying to handle the issue, whereby several Articles highlighted the concerns surrounding its existence.
Article 24 prohibits the
employment of children below the age of 14 years in any factory, mine or engaged in any other hazardous employment, while Article 39 (e) provides that the health and strength of workers - men and women - and young children are not abused or forced by economic necessity to enter avocation unsuited to their age of strength. Article 39(f) provides that children are given opportunities and facilities to develop in a healthy manner and in conditions of freedom
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