As a very rough weather destroys the buds of the spring, so does to early an experience of lifes hard oil blight the younger promise of a childs faculties, and render any true education impossible. How true these words of Pope Leo XIII sound in the context of children being forced to work.
Despite planning , welfare programmes, legislation and administrative action in the past few decades , a large majority od children of the age group of 5-14 years continue to remain in distress and turmoil. Child laboures are exploited, exposed to hazardous work conditions and paid a pittance for their long hours of work. They are forced to leave schooling ,shouldering responsibilities for beyond their years. But no one steps forward to this. On june 17, 1999 the member states of the ILO unanimously voted to adopt convention 182 on the world forms of child labour. It was recognized that ending the commercial exploitation of children must be one of the mankinds to priorities. NGOs trade unions and various social service organization have launced innovative programmes to crub the problem of child labour.
Definitional Inadequacy
There is a definitional inadequacy of child labour. The conventional definition of a worker adopted by National sample survey organization and population census lead to an under enumeration od child workers as these data sources do not count the unpaid workers in the family enterprises. Although certain work can be benefical and can enhance a childs physical, mental, moral and social development without interfering in schooling and recreation. Studies have shown that helping parents in their household activities or other activities after school in their free time contributes positively to the all round development of a child. When such work is truly a part of the labour, either paid or unpaid and is working within or outside the family; basically, a child who is deprived of the right to education and childhood.
Child labour is a nrgative concept. It hampers the normal physical, intellectual and emotional development of a child. UNICEF classified the problems of child labour inti three categories, namely (i) Physical (ii) cognative (iii) Emotional, social and moral.
ILOs Recent Survey
There are 5.59 million child laborers toiling in the Philippines and almost all of them are working in hazardous conditions, according to a survey financed by the ILO.
The 2011 survey on children conducted by the National Statistics office (NSO) abd released Tuesday showed that out of the 29.019 million Filipino children aged 5-17 years old, about 18.9% or 5.59% million, were already working.
This is higher than the 4 million Filipino working children registered in a 2001 survey conducted by the ILO and the US Dept of labour. Of those 5.59 million children at work, 3.028 million were considered as child laborers and 2.993 million were reported to be exposed to hazardous child labour.
Worst forms of labour
The regions which had the highest incidence of child labour were central Luzon, Bicol, western visayas, Northern Mindanao, and Central Visayas, the survey showed.
Ericta said the 2.993 million child laborers exposed to hazardous conditions could include those involved in the worst forms of child labor- the sex trade, drug trafficking, other illicit activities and armed confilict.
They could be include but they re not labeled as such. This is because when you ask them where they work, they could say theyre waitresses when they are actually prostituted children.
These (2.993 million) are the ones exposed to chemicals biological hazards like bacteria that cause diseases or physical hazards.
The Philippines has pledged to reduce by 75% all worst forms of child labor by 2015, which is anchored on the united Nations millennium development goal of achieving universal education.
Child Labour in India
It is difficult to say an exact figure for the number of children engaged in childs labour in India. This difficulty is attributed to the fact that the Indian Government has been negligent to collect and analyze the relevant data regarding the incidence of child labour.
Census data shows an overall child work participation rate of 12.69% in 1961 and 7.13% in 1971. This data is misleading because the difinations of child labour are different in the two censuses ( unpaid workers are not included in the 1971 census), thus a comparision cannot be completely valid. The 1981 census reports that there were 13.6 million child labourers in India. Government extrapolation of this 1981 data place the current number od child labourers between seventeen and twenty million (Human Rights watch 1996). This extrapolation seems highly unlikely as the official National sample survey of 1983 of India reports 17.4 million child ladourers, while a study sponsored by the labour ministry, concluded that the child-labour force was 44 million in 1983. A universal difficulty in obtaining accurate data may be that individual fail to report child labour participation during survey, for fear of legal action. Moreover, all these estimates fall short of the actual figures for a number of other reasons like multiplicity of definations, different methods of computation, diverse sources of data, lack of information on the vast unorganized sector of the economy. These estimates of the magnitude of child labour in India vary
* 13.6 million The 1981 census
* 17.36 million The planning commission, 1983
* 44 million The operation research group, Baroda, 1983
* 20 Million Labour Ministry, August 1994
* 12.5 million The 2001 census.
Shocking Revelation
Acc to 2001 census, the states where child worker population is more than one million were Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh , Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh ,while the ratio of working children to the total workers was highest in Andhara Pradesh followed by Karnataka ,Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan. Several studies indicate that a majority of the working children are concentrated in the rural area. About 60% oh them are below the age of 10 years. The surveys of the meteropolitan and Mega- cities make shocking revelations. Mumbai has the largest number of child labourers. The number of children in urban areas who work in the canteens and restaurants or engaged in picking rags and hawking goods is vast but unrecorded. Among the most unfortunate ones are those who are employed in hazardous industries for instance, the fire works and match box units. Pencil industry, glass industry and so on. Most of these children work in dhabas, tea stalls and restaurants on a meager daily wage basis. Perferences for the child workers are most common in unorganized sector because here it is easy for the employers to circumvent laws.
Children especially girls are trafficked each year across international borders. They are deprived of the most fundamental human victum and are subjected to thread of violence. Victums trafficking are made to toil under horrific conditions in sweat- shops, on construction sites, in fields and in brothels. Women and children some as young as seven to eleven years old, are forced to become sex workers where they suffer physical and mental abuse and are exposed to disease, including infection by the HIV virus.
Poverty and child labour
Poverty has an obvious relationship with child labour and several studies have revealed a positive correlation, child labour is a source on income for poor families in India. Childrens work is considered essential to maintaining the economic level of households, either in the form for wages. Or to help in household enterprises or in household courses on order to free adult household member for economic activity elsewhere. For the same type of work children are paid less than their adult counterpart. What was apparent is the fact that child labourers are being exploited, evident by the pay that they receive.
Besides poverty one major factor which has a strong relationship with child labour in India is caste. If the data on child labour are compared with the caste structure of the country, it would be evident that a comparatively higher proportion of schedule caste children work at a younger age for their own and their families. Lower caste children tend to be pushed into child labour because of their familys poverty. The combination of poverty and the lack of a social security network is also responsible for bonded child labour. For the poor, there are few credit sources, and even if there are sources like cooperative loan, bank loan etc available, only few poor families manage to satisfy the essential criteria released to access those. Here enters local moneylender, with ex-orbitant high interest rates. Most of the times if is not possible for the poor to return back these loans and the parents exchange their childs labour to local moneylenders. Since the earnings of bonded child labourers are less than the interest on the loans, these bonded children ate forced to work, while interest on their loans goes on accumulating. Even if bonded child labourers are released, The same conditions of poverty that caused the initial debt cause to slip back into bondage. Lastly but not the least, the attitude of parents also contribute to child labour, some parents feel that children should work in order to develop skills useful in the job market, instead of taking advantage of a formal education. Some scholars even argue that the economic justification cited for child labour must be seen less a phenomena of poverty and more of social attitudes and sensibilities. But these arguments are weak in themselves as they seek to compare the growth stages of developing countries to that with the developing countries.
Government efforts
Non-availability of accurate and up-to-date on child labour has been a major handicap in planned intervention for eradication of this social evil. However, from the time of independence, India has committed itself to contain child labour and has stood through constitutional, and development measures that are required to eliminate child labour. Article 24 of the Indian constitution clearly states that No child below the age of fourteen years shall be employed to work in any factory on mine or employed in any hazardous employment. Article 39 (e) directs state policy towards securing : the health and strength of orkers and the tender age of children are not abused and that citizens are not forced by economic necessity to enter a vocation unsuited to their age of strength. The Indian government implemented the child labour act in 1986. The purpose of this act is to prohibit the employment of children who have no completed their 14 years in specified hazardous occupations and prosesses. Besided this govt has announced the National policy on child labour in August 1987. The Action plan under the policy included:
* Focusing of general development programmes for benefiting children whenever possible.
* Project based actions plans in areas of high concentration of child labour engaged in wage/ quasi wage employment.
August 1994, when Prime Minister Narasima Rao announced his proposal of the elimination of child labour programme. This program was designed to end child labour for two million children in hazardous industries as defined in the chilf labour act on 1986, by the year 2000. The programme revolves around an incentive for children to quit their work and enter non-formal schooling: a one hundred rupees payment as well as one meal a day for attending school.
Conclusion
Despite a plethora of laws and regulations to check this evil, the real problem is in implementation .it is clear that unless overall economic conditions in the country improve, the problem cannot be solved. Coupled with economic growth, there should also be an awareness drive to educate the middle class, entrepreneurs and other employers about taking measures to see that they do not in any way encourage this ugly phenomenon.
We have to accept the truth that we, the citizens of this country , are equally responsible for perpetuating this social evil. We have to extend a helping hand to the gonernment agencies, NGOs and other voluntary organizations that are involved in the mission to eradicate this menance.
Bibliography- News papers, Latest ILO websites. Bibhash kumar sharma article related to child labour
NAME- ROHIN KOTWAL
