Fourteen-year-old Anand (name changed) looked pale and anaemic, while sitting in the corner of a boys’ shelter. He had been coughing continuously.
“He has been diagnosed with tuberculosis, and is getting weaker,” said R. Vasantha, project coordinator and caretaker of the Chennai Corporation shelter run by Arunodhaya, centre for street and working children in R.R Nagar, Kodungaiyur.
“He had been working as a rag picker in the Corporation dumpyard for 13 years. We brought him here six months ago. He looked extremely sick and famished then. He is now under treatment,” she said.
The young boy is among 128 rag picking children who have been rescued from the dump yard by the organisation in the last two years.
Reunited with families
'Among them 41 have been mainstreamed — they have been either sent to proper schools or they are no longer engaged in rag picking.
They said 17 boys were reunited with their families, while 26 more live at the shelter.
Most rescued children belonged to poor families and got into rag picking only because their families were part of it, said Ms. Vasantha.
There are over 50 families who continue to live around the 300-acre dumpyard and many are yet to be rescued and rehabilitated.
“One of the boys, whom we recently rescued, was born at the dumpyard and lived there with his mother. After we enrolled him in school, his mother continues to force him to go back to work,” said Virgil D’Sami, Executive Director, Arunodhaya.
Prohibited activities
Rag picking and scavenging are among 63 other activities prohibited under Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) (A) Bill, 2012.
However despite regulations, children continue to be a part of this hazardous process and very little is done to rescue them from the dumpyard, experts said.
P. Joseph Victor Raj, national convenor, Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL) pointed out that while the existing law was not stringent in terms of rehabilitation, the recently proposed bill, which has slashed down hazardous occupations from 83 to 3, will worsen the conditions if it is passed.
“Children’s employment should be prohibited in all occupations where there is a subordinate relationship of work and labour,” he added.
Children got into rag picking as their families are part of it, says project coordinator
