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Backgrounder
India has all along followed a pro-active policy in tackling the problem of child labour. It has always stood for constitutional, statutory and developmental measures, which are needed to eliminate child labour. India’s judiciary upto the apex level has demonstrated profoundly emphatic responses against the practice of child labour. New Delhi has ratified six ILO conventions exclusively related to child labour. India’s policy on child labour has evolved over the years in this backdrop.
Child labour is a complex socio-economic problem to be dealt through sustained efforts over a period of time. While there could be many reasons for children not being able to complete even their primary education or the vocational training programmes, studies have revealed that it is poverty of the families, extent of social backwardness and an unsuitable curriculum which have contributed to the children either not going to school or dropping out of school even before they complete their compulsory education.
As per the provisional figures of Census 2001, there are 12.5 million working children in age group of 5-14 years as compared to the child population of 252 million.
Concerted attempts have been made to follow a pro-active policy in the matter of tackling the problem through constitutional, statutory and developmental measures. Article 24, 39 and 45 of the Constitution of India consciously incorporate provisions to secure labour protection and free and compulsory education for children up to the age of 14 years.
The policy of the Government is to ban employment of children below the age of 14 years in factories, mines and hazardous employment and to regulate the working conditions of children in other employments. The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 seeks to achieve this basic objective. It prohibits employment of children in 13 occupations and 57 processes.
The Act also regulates the working conditions of children in all other employment, which are not prohibited under the child labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986. Section 14 of the Act provides for penalties for contravention of the various provisions under the Act.
Any person who employs any child in contravention of the provisions of section 3 of the Act shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than three months but which may extend to Rs. 20,000 or both. After having been convicted, any one committing a like offence shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to two years.
The State Governments and Union Territory Administrations furnish information to the Central Government on implementation of the provisions of the Act in the form of periodical reports. During the last five year, over 1.3 million inspections were conducted and 21, 246 violations were identified Prosecutions were launched in 12,348 cases resulting in 6,305 convictions.
Government is committed to the goal of eradication of child labour in all its forms. Considering the nature and magnitude of the problem a gradual and sequential approach has been adopted to withdraw and rehabilitate child labour beginning with the children working in hazardous occupations and processes.
A Scheme to eliminate child labour has been launched under which National Child Labour Projects (NCLPs) have been set up in child labour endemic areas to rehabilitate children released from work. Under the scheme, Project societies are set up at the district level under the Chairmanship of the Collector/District Magistrate for overseeing implementation of the project.
The major activity under the NCLP is the establishment of special schools to provide non-formal/formal education, vocational training, stipend, and health check up, supplementary nutrition etc to children withdrawn from employment.
The Scheme started in 1988 is cent percent Centrally funded. The number of National Child Labour Projects has been increased from existing 100 to 250 in as many districts in child labour endemic states for mainstreaming of children into formal schooling system during the current Plan. Fifty districts have already been identified and project launched on January 14, 2004 during the visit of Director General, International labour Organisation in India. The process for the identification of rest of 100 districts on the basis of 2001 census data on child labour has also been completed and NCLPs in these districts are likely to be launched very soon.
The children who have been identified as child labourers and who are between the ages of 5-8 would be put directly into the formal schooling system. The child labourers in 9-14 age group would be put through a special schooling mechanism before mainstreaming them into the formal schooling system. It is expected that these steps will lead to mainstreaming into formal schooling system of all children in 5-14 age groups who are found working in hazardous occupations and processes by the end of the 10th Plan. The Budgetary allocation for the scheme during the Ninth Five-Year Plan was Rs.2496 million. It has been substantially stepped up during the Tenth Plan to Rs.6675 million.
Government has also launched the INDO-US Child Labour Project on February 16, 2004. The INDUS Project would be supportive of Government initiative towards complete elimination of child labour and help to achieve the targets set for the Tenth Plan period. It aims at providing support for elimination of child labour from identified 10 hazardous occupations in 5 states namely Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and National Capital Territory of Delhi. The basic objective of this project is withdrawing, rehabilitating, preventing and progressively eliminating child labour in the 10 hazardous occupations in 21 identified district in 5 states. This project has been developed based on the model of the NCLP scheme.
Apart from direct rehabilitation of children working in hazardous occupations, several other programmes are in operation. These include Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS). It is the single largest programme in the whole world for pregnant mothers and children in terms of immunization, nutrition and pre-primary early childhood education. Education has been recognized as an important tool to prevent child labour. Government has a constitutional commitment to free and compulsory universal primary education. The programme of universal primary education known as ‘Sarva Shekhsha Abiyan’ has been launched throughout the country. Atleast one primary schools have been set up in each of almost six hundred thousand villages of India. Many states have mid-day meal programmes in schools to improve the nutritional level of school going children and also to induce the parents to send their children to schools rater than to work.
India has all along consistently taken a view that child labour is human rights and development-related issue and not a trade related issue. New Delhi has welcomed international cooperation and support in the elimination of child labour, but such cooperation and support must respect the dignity of status of the sovereign democratic country and also the peculiarities and complexities of the socio-economic environment obtaining in that country.
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