|
There are 1.2 crore child labourers in the country as per the 2001 census. The census, however, does not specify the occupations of working children. The total number of child labourer who had been mainstreamed into formal system of education through National Child Labour projects so far is 3,07,863. The National Child Labour project scheme was started in 1998 to rehabilitate child labour. The Scheme seeks to adopt a sequential approach with focus on rehabilitation of children working in hazardous occupations and processes in the first instance. Under the Scheme, after a survey of child labour engaged in hazardous occupations and processes has been conducted, children are to be withdrawn from these occupations and processes and then put into special schools in order to enable them to be mainstreamed into formal schooling system. The strategy of the Government is to eliminate child labour from hazardous occupations and processes by the end of the Tenth Five Year Plan.
This was stated in a written reply by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Shri K. Chandrasekhar Rao, in Rajya Sabha today.
MLD/LK/ L-181 (21.4.)
|
