The Hindu : Children against child labour

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 08, 2003

National

National

Children against child labour

By K. Balchand

PATNA Nov. 7. A group of ``rescued'' children from Patna have launched a campaign to ensure for those like them, engaged as domestic workers, better living conditions. The campaign started at the bungalows of Ministers.

In leading the movement, the Bachpan Bachao Andolan has underlined the Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo, Laloo Prasad Yadav's commitment to rid the State of child labour, liberate them, and ensure education to all in the 6 to 10 age group. The secretary of the Andolan said that Mr. Yadav had made the declaration at a function organised by it last year.

``We are implementing the stated policy of the State Government,'' said one of the children. The group includes Vikas, Chandni, Dheeraj and Rupa, who were among the 50 odd children who went from one ministerial residence to another. Vikas, 8, was once a rag-picker, while Dheeraj, 12, worked in a shop. Chandni, 13, was denied education by her father because she was a girl, and Rupa, 10, washed dishes for a living. Today they all go to school.

The children seemed to serve as an effective pressure group as they knocked on the doors of the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Ramchandra Purve. Although taken aback by the sudden appearance of a large number of children at his doorstep, the Minister welcomed them and told them about the two children that he employed at his residence. He, however, clarified that one of them studied in a school where his wife was a teacher. And, at the instance of the group, Dr. Purve had the other boy too admitted to a school. The two children are the sons of Ram Shanker Paswan, a rickshaw-puller, and Suresh Nut, a sweeper, both of whom live in the servants' quarters of the Minister. The Minister has since put up a board declaring his home to be a ``Baal Mitra Ghar.'' He said he would urge the Chief Minister, Rabri Devi, to instruct all her Ministers to either liberate those children employed as domestic servants or ensure that they were provided education and proper living conditions.

The Water Resources Development Minister, Jagdanand Singh, let the little ones go round his bungalow to satisfy themselves that he had not hired any child labourers. The children left a note at the residences of the Energy Minister, Shakeel Ahmed, and the Minister of State for Health, Akhilesh Kumar Singh, who were not at home, seeking appointments with them.

The campaign has been taken up in an upper class area where according to a survey conducted by the Andolan more than 467 children in the 5 to 13 age group were employed in the homes of the VIPs and politicians. This figure was estimated to comprise 30 per cent of the 5,000 children engaged as domestic workers in the State capital for wages ranging from Rs. 100 to Rs. 300 a month. The living conditions of about 50 per cent of them were deplorable. Only 2 per cent of the employers ensured school education to the child labourers, the survey found.

Almost 86 per cent of these workers happened to have a rural background. This fact underscored the problem of migration of labour where the parents feel that such employment of their children is useful when they themselves migrate to other States to eke out a living. In most cases the hapless parents are well aware of the travails of their children.

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