Thursday, July 29, 2010

Is child labour worth it?


Hello!

I have read somewhere that a child’s mind is like a blank sheet of paper. It gets molded the way her/his parents, teachers, etc. shape it. Most of us hooked to the Internet at this moment are very lucky. Our parents loved us, cared for us, provided for us. We should know better to count our blessings, rather than crib about trivial issues.

This has been my thought process all along. However, recently, I came across a news article that upset me. There was a report in the Hindustan Times (20th July, 2010, Page 13, "Re 1 per hour: Children fuel Bt cotton boom") about how children (approx 25,000 to 30,000) brought over from Rajasthan were being used to pluck Bt-cotton in Banskantha and Sabarkantha(Gujarat). Gujarat produces half of all the cotton in India.

Child labor is a crime; however agricultural labour being non-hazardous children are allowed to work for up to 6 hours a day. Here the children were reported to be totally exploited (read: made to work 12-14 hours a day) and were not even taken care of (read: 40-50 children packed off in a room) – that too for meager wages (read: approx Rs.13/- per day). Health hazards are common and some children have died too. Why do the parents allow it all? There is always paucity of funds with the poor; extra income is always welcome. Parents get paid an "advance" of Rs.500/-. The children earn somewhere around Rs.1000/- for the 3 month period.


After reading the entire report I was filled with anger. There was anger with the parents, anger with children who complied, anger with the "mates", anger at the landowners who hired children, anger at the government and anger at the system in general. When we have a nation of 1 billion people, do we really need to employ children at meager wages to get our jobs done? When there is rampant unemployment, technological advances, et al, why are children being targeted so?

We need to remember these children are India’s future. Long after you and me will be gone, they will still be here. They will know, they will remember and they may react, or worse still pass on the tradition to their progeny. Is that what we really want?

2 comments:

  1. If the government cared to do its job, these kids wouldn't have to worry about working to survive.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I somewhat agree. I recently heard it on the news somewhere that labourers were paid a mere Re.1 for 12 hours of manual labour per day - they were hired for 11 days, so total wages paid was a pathetic Rs.11!

    ReplyDelete

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