Child Labour

A Social Problem in India

 Table of contents

Sr.no. Contents Page no.

1. Introduction

2. Objectives

3. Data Analysis

4. Conclusions

5. References
 Introduction to Child Labour
The first thing which comes to our mind when someone talks about India,
that is the incredibility of Indian culture, food, history, Environment. Even
may think about the air pollution, over population and poverty faced by
many Indians. So India is definitely a place that produces mixed images for
a large number of people.
There are numerous important issues which are needed to be addressed
among which child labour is the significant social problem in India. You
might be surprised to know that in India there are over 8.3 million child
Labourers who are between the age of 5 and 14(Save the children, 2016).
Children are the greatest gift to humanity and Childhood is an important
and impressionable stage of human development as it holds the potential to
the future development of any society. Children who are brought up in an
environment, which is conducive to their intellectual, physical and social
health, grow up to be responsible and productive members of society. Every
nation links its future with the present status of its children.
What is the concept of child labour?
The category of population that falls between the birth and physical
maturity is termed as ‘child’. Child means a person who has not completed
his fourteenth year of age. This section of children is not at their teens. The
children in this age group are in formative stage physically and mentally.
Any kind of exploitation and oppression on them lead to child abuse. The
working children of this age-group between 6-14 years of age are therefore,
dubbed as ‘child labour’.
The term child labour though is used as a synonym for working child or
child worker but more commonly it is used in a derisive sense that signify
something which is scornful, insulting and exploitative in nature. Thus the
child labour is defined as any kind of work by children which interferes with
their full physical development, their opportunities for desirable minimum
education and their needed recreation (Folks Homer). In true sense of the
term the child labour indicates the employment of children in gainful
occupation in which they are denied the opportunities of mental, moral
development apart from physical growth.
According to the ILO (Indian Labour Organisation) Child Labour refers to
work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their
dignity, and that is harmful to their physical and or mental development. It
refers to work that is mentally, or morally dangerous and harmful to
children; and or interferes with their schooling by:
 depriving them of the opportunity to attend school
  obliging them to leave school prematurely
 requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with
excessively long and heavy work.
By performing work when they are too young for the task, children
extremely reduce their present welfare or their future income earning
capabilities, either by shrinking their future external choice sets or by
reducing their own future productive capabilities. Under extreme economic
distress, children are forced to forego educational opportunities and take up
jobs which are mostly exploitative as they are usually underpaid and
engaged in hazardous conditions.
Parents decide to send their child for engaging in a job as a desperate
measure due to poor economic conditions. It is therefore no wonder that the
poor households predominantly send their children to work in early ages of
their life. One of the disconcerting aspects of child labour is that children
are sent to work at the expense of education. There is a strong effect of child
labour on school attendance rates and the length of a child’s work day is
negatively associated with his or her capacity to attend school. Child labour
restricts the right of children to access and benefit from education and
denies the fundamental opportunity to attend school.
Child labour extends into many different activities such as agriculture,
manufacturing, mining and domestic service. Children are forced into child
labour because of distinct factors; migration, emergencies, the lack of decent
work available and poverty which is known as the most influencing
factor. (UNICEF, 2017).
Thus we can say that child labour creates an adverse effect on children
education, health and safety.

Objectives of studying Child Labour

 The main purpose of this study was to find out the factors which are
responsible for child labour like the reasons for working, problems
faced by the child, workplace conditions, etc.
 Giving suggestion to reduce child Labour and promoting education in
relevant area.
 What are the precautionary measures taken by the government?
 Historical Perspective of Child Labour
The employment of children in India, in the form of slavery, was mentioned
even in Kautilya's Arthshastra of 3th century B.C. it describes the existence
of domestic slavery, in many prosperous households, where slaves were
normally from low cast child slaves of less than eight years of age were
known working in many noble’s houses.
In medieval period, children were normally placed as trainees under artisans
and craftsman certain crafts depends totally on the employment of children.
The tradition still continuous in carpet weaving or cotton or silk weaving
industries which provide employment to large number of children even today
in our country.
In agrarian society, children work according to their capacities and there
was always considered as a part and process of socialisation, children of
agriculturist had to perform specific tasks. Thus, many children were
interested with the work that was time consuming, while elders were busing
in more effort intensive laborious skilled tasks. The children from
agriculturists families from their early ages started learning and functioning
as participate and productive members of the family and community.
In 18th Century industrial revolution in England, gave a new turn to the
history of mankind it brought a change in the overall economic and social
order, which was for distinct than earlier period. Till then, the worker
whether an 'adult' or a 'child' irrespective of his work place had his identity
in the scenario.
After industrial revolution, the change come about in the pattern of
production that is the adoption of new management techniques technology
and ownership of asset. It brought along with it a change in human
relations which was never enlisted before it attached the value to a labour of
a person and the values determination was in the hands of employers. The
large number of children therefore, was appointed initially by the mill
owners and later by factory owner. Secondly, the demand for child labour in
agricultural sector also increased due to the migration of adult man folk to
industrial towns that children replaced of them to run various agricultural
operations.
The terms 'child labour' is at times used as a synonym for 'employed child'
or 'working child' in this sense it is coextensive with any work done by a
child for economic gain. But more often than not, the term 'child labour' is
used in social sense. It suggests something which is harmful, unjust and
full of exploitation. In India, there is hardly any statutory provision which
defines the term 'child labour' in precise terms even those various legislative
provisions which prescribe the minimum age for the admission to
employment in different vocations do not fix uniform age for reasons of
variations in the nature of the operations in which children are employed.
 What are the causes of child labour?
There are many reasons why children end up working in jobs that can have
long hours or dangerous working conditions. Typically, all these reasons
stem from their families living in extreme poverty which makes them
vulnerable to economic shocks. Some of the common reasons why children
end up in working as a child labour are as follows.
The curse of poverty:
The main reason for child labour in India is poverty. Most of the country’s
population suffers from poverty. Due to poverty, parents cannot afford the
studies of their children and make them earn their wages from a younger
age. In fact, they are well aware of the grief of losing their loved ones to
poverty many times. They send their small children to work in factories,
homes, and shops. They are made to work to increase the income of their
poor families at the earliest. These decisions are taken only for the purpose
of better standards of living for their family. But such decisions shatter
children's physical and mental state as they lose their childhood at an early
age.

Lack of educational resources:

Even after 73 years of our country's independence, there are instances
where children are deprived of their fundamental right to education. There
are thousands of villages in our country where there are no proper facilities
for education. And if there is any, it is miles away. Such administrative
laxity is also responsible for child labour in India. The worst sufferers are
the poor families for whom getting their children educated is a dream.
Sometimes the lack of affordable school for the education of poor children
leaves them illiterate and helpless. Children are forced to live without
studying. And sometimes such compulsions push them into the trap of child
labour in India.

Social and economic backwardness:

Social and economic backwardness is also the main reason for child labour
in India. Socially backward parents do not send their children to receive an
education. Consequently, their children are trapped in child labour. Due to
illiteracy, many times parents are not aware of various information and
schemes for child education. Lack of education, illiteracy and consequently
the lack of awareness of their rights among them have encouraged child
labour. Also, uneducated parents do not know about the impact of child
labour on their children. The conditions of poverty and unemployment give
rural families a compulsive basis for engaging children in various tasks. In
fact, feudal or zamindari system and its existing remnants continue to
extend the problem of child labour in India.
Addiction, disease or disability:
In many families, due to alcohol addiction, disease or disability, there is no
earning, and the child's wages are the sole means of family’s sustenance.
Population growth is also increasing unemployment, which has an adverse
impact on child labour prevention. So, parents, instead of sending their
children to school, are willing to send them to work to increase family
income.

The lure of cheap labour:

In the greed of cheap labour, some shopkeepers, companies and factory
owners employ children so that they have to pay less to them and it
amounts
to employing cheap labour. Shopkeepers and small businessmen make
children work as much as they do to the elder ones but pay half the wages.
In the case of child labour, there is less chance for theft, greed or
misappropriation of money too. With the development of globalization,
privatization, and consumerist culture, the need for cheap labour and its
linkage with the economic needs of poor families have encouraged child
labour in India.

Family tradition:
It is a shocking but bitter truth that in our society it is very easy to give
child labour the name of tradition or custom in many families. The cultural
and traditional family values play their role in increasing the problem of
child labour in India at the voluntary level. Many families believe that a good
life is not their destiny, and the age-old tradition of labour is the only source
of their earning and livelihood.

Small businessmen also waste the lives of their children in the greediness of
perpetuating their family trade with lower production costs. Some families
also believe that working from childhood onwards will make their children
more diligent and worldly-wise in terms of future life. They believe that early
employment will give rise to their children’s personal development, which
will make it easier for them to plan their life ahead.

Discrimination between boys and girls:

We have been conditioned into believing that girls are weaker and there is
no equal comparison between boys and girls. Even today, in our society, we
will find many examples where girls are deprived of studies. Considering
girls weaker than boys deprives them of school and education. In labourer
families, girls are found to be engaged in labour along with their parents.
 Negative effects of child Labour
Children are exposed to accidental and other injuries at work. They should
thus be protected to prevent social, economic and physical harm, which
persist to affect them during their lifetime. Such injuries include:

 General child injuries and abuses like cuts, burns, and lacerations,
fractures, tiredness and dizziness, excessive fears and nightmares.
 Sexual abuse, particularly sexual exploitation of girls by adults, rape,
prostitution, early and unwanted pregnancy, abortion, Sexually
Transmitted Diseases (STDs) and HIV/AIDS, drugs and alcoholism.
 Physical abuse that involves corporal punishment, emotional
maltreatment such as blaming, belittling, verbal attacks, rejection,
humiliation and bad remarks.
 Emotional neglect such as deprivation of family love and affection,
resulting in loneliness, and hopelessness.
 Physical neglect like lack of adequate provision of food, clothing,
shelter and medical treatment.
 Lack of schooling results in missing educational qualifications and
higher skills thus perpetuating their life in poverty.
 Competition of children with adult workers leads to depressing wages
and salaries.
Apart from the above, lack of opportunity for higher education for older
children deprives the nation of developing higher skills and technological
capabilities that are required for economic development/transformation to
attain higher income and better standards of living.

Impact of child Labour in India and all over the world

The global estimates indicate that 152 million children – 64 million girls and
88 million boys – are in child labour globally, accounting for almost one in
ten of all children worldwide.
Seventy-one percent of children in child labour work in the agricultural
sector and 69 percent perform unpaid work within their own family unit.
Nearly half of all those in child labour – 73 million children in absolute
terms – are in hazardous work that directly endangers their health, safety,
and moral development. Children in forced labour, the worst form of child
labour that is estimated using a separate methodology, number 4.3 million,
ILO (2017).
According to Global childhood report 2019; 4.4 million fewer child deaths
per year, 49 million fewer stunted children, 115 million fewer children out of
school, 94 million fewer child labourers, 11 million fewer married girls, 3
million fewer teen births per year, 12,000 fewer child homicides per year.
According to census 2011, there were 255 million economically active
children in the age group of 5-14 years.
1 in every 11 children in India works to earn a living, India’s 2011 census
revealed that more than 10.2 million “economically active” children in the
age group of five to 14 years- 5.6 million boys and 4.5 million girls.
Eight million children were working in rural areas, and 2 million in urban
areas. Although in rural settings the number of child workers reduced from
11 million to 8 million between the 2001 and 2011 censuses, over the same
period, the number of children working in urban settings rose from 1.3
million to 2 million, Lal (2019).
The scenario of child labour in India varies from state to state. In states
like Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra,
Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Puducherry and Andaman & Nicobar, the issue of
child labour is an important point of debate for the social watchers as it has
assumed unbearable proportions. But the silver lining is that in these states
also the phenomenon of child labour is reducing gradually from 1991 to
2001 and 2011. Below we give the details of states with the highest and
lowest number of child labour and the ratio of child labour to the total
population in these states.
Below we give the details of states with the highest and lowest number of
child labour and the ratio of child labour to the total population in these
states.