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Child rescue protocol coming next week

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: The government will next week release a Protocol on Prevention, Rescue, Repatriation and Rehabilitation of migrant and trafficked child labour.

The protocol will lay down guidelines on actions to be taken by different departments of the State governments, police, NGOs and other stakeholders in rescuing and rehabilitating child workers.

Since a large number of rescued child labour are migrants who need to be sent back to their states, the protocol has provisions for repatriation of such children also, Union Labour and Employment Secretary Sudha Pillai told reporters here on Thursday. The protocol has been drafted on the directions of the Delhi High Court and will be sent to all the States who are bound to implement it. The Centre will monitor its implementation.

Ms. Pillai said the Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) would be able to put in place multi-fund managers by September to maximise return on investment. Expression of Interest has been issued in this connection and Crisil has been engaged as a consultant for finalising the fund managers. The EPFO, however, is not ready to invest 5 per cent of the corpus in the stock markets because of a highly volatile market that would be risky.

Ms. Pillai said more than 50,000 smart cards have been issued in the Capital, Haryana and Rajasthan under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana, a health insurance scheme for those living below the poverty line that became operational from April 1, 2008. Twenty-eight individuals have already availed themselves of the benefits of the scheme, which will be rolled out to 60 million people in the next five years.

This will be the biggest-ever exercise involving Income Tax applications for the poorest of the poor families in the country or anywhere else in the world.

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