Child Labor in India

Child labor in India is a human rights issue related to the employment of children under the age of fifteen in the workforce in India. Child labor is considered detrimental to the physical, social, and mental health of children, and it is condemned as a practice by the world's governing bodies. Child labor has proven to be a particularly troublesome national problem in India, which in the early twenty-first century had the world's largest population under the age of eighteen.

Child laborers are often victimized in several significant ways. In addition to the negative impact on their education, they are typically paid low wages and suffer greater risks to their psychological and physical development. As such, they are protected by international rule. Article 32 of the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child states that "government(s) should protect children from work that is dangerous or might harm their health or their education... Children's work should not jeopardize any of their other rights, including their right to education, or the right to relaxation and play."

India is not alone in having a problem with child labor. The 2015 World Report on Child Labour from the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that, worldwide, 168 million children under the age of fifteen were in the workforce. However, many experts have suggested that India is a notable focal point of the issue on the global stage. While India officially estimated in its 2011 national census that 4.3 million children were working regularly, the true number is believed to be much higher—and may be as high as 10 to 30 million. India is thought to account for as many as one-quarter of all children employed in the labor sector worldwide.

Definition of Child Labor

The United Nations Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF)—the UN agency in charge of promoting the humanitarian rights of children—defines "child labor" as follows:

• Any child between the ages of five and eleven who is engaged in at least 1 hour of economic activity or at least 28 hours of domestic work per week; or
• Any child between the ages of twelve and fourteen who participates in at least 14 hours of economic activity or 42 hours of combined economic and domestic work within a given week.

While some organizations define any employed child under the age of fifteen as a child laborer, this view has not garnered broad support. For example, children who voluntarily help their families with a business but continue their schooling uninterrupted, without negative repercussions to their general welfare, are not typically identified as child labor. UNICEF instead identifies exploitive child labor according to the following criteria:

• Children begin working too young.
• Children, even those employed directly by their families, work too many hours.
• Children are placed in jobs that create physical, psychological, or social hardships for them.
• Children work in unsafe conditions.
• Children are paid unfair wages.
• Children ten and under are given too much responsibility, such as caring for younger siblings.
• Children are given repetitive tasks that stunt their psychological and social development.
• Children are placed in situations—such as begging or prostitution—that lower their self-esteem.

In India, children are regularly exploited in each of these categories. For instance, despite Indian laws banning the employment of children under eighteen in hazardous industries, more than twenty percent of working adolescents are employed in potentially dangerous arenas, such as construction and mining. Similarly, many textile factories employ large numbers of children for long hours at highly repetitive tasks.

UNICEF separates child labor into three categories: (1) within the family, (2) within the family but outside the home, and (3) outside the home. The first category includes any job that a child does specifically for the family without pay. This may include working on a family farm, helping staff a household business, or caring for younger siblings. The second category, in which children work within the family but outside the home, consists of children who work for pay alongside their family members. These children typically are employed in domestic or agricultural industries, or in self-employed tasks, such as collecting materials from dumps for recycling. In the final category, children who work outside the home are often sent to a job alone. These children may be employed locally at a farm or factory, or they may be forced to travel to another location to send wages home to the family. Children in this category may have been placed into bonded labor or apprenticeship work, or may have been kidnapped and placed into forced labor. For girls, this can include prostitution or domestic service; boys may become child soldiers or professional beggars.

In India, the most common jobs for children are domestic servants, farm workers, and factory workers. However, the trafficking of children for forced labor, and the practice of placing children into bonded labor to pay off a family's debt to a money lender—two practices equated to slavery—continue to be problematic. Children in India's urban slums are often tasked with digging through dumps to find items that they can resell, an undertaking that can have severe consequences on their health and educational opportunities.

Reasons for Child Labor

Child labor is a particular problem in India for a variety of reasons. The primary underlying cause is poverty. Many low-income families struggle to make enough money to provide for shelter and food for their members. For these families, putting a child to work may be necessary for basic survival. In such cases, education may be less of a priority, especially if knowledge seems to lack relevance to the family’s home life.

Social customs play a huge role. Traditional gender roles and the caste system (a traditional system of social stratification) have established strong barriers to socio-economic advancement in India. For example, in the rural areas of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra—the Indian states with the highest rates of child labor—the education of girls is historically low in priority. This can be linked to cultural practices in which women and men serve in very different roles in the community. Women’s jobs are seen as less important, and therefore educating girls is not valued.

Similarly, the caste system made movement between social classes difficult. In India, people were historically assigned to their parents’ social class at birth. Members of the lowest social caste, the Dalits (or "untouchables"), typically experience the highest rates of child labor. Not surprisingly, Dalits also traditionally have the lowest standards of living of any social group.

Other factors also play a role. A lack of social services, overpopulation, and limited educational opportunities in many parts of the country are contributing factors. India is the world's largest democracy, but it is also an enormous and diverse nation with large pockets of poverty. While the government has passed many laws intended to address problems with child labor, enforcement is difficult. Additionally, complications with official corruption that disrupt the implementation of laws limit their effectiveness.

Further complicating the issue is the age of the victims. Often, the biggest victims are also the most vulnerable—the youngest children. Many children are not aware that they have legal rights and do not realize that they may have life alternatives beyond menial labor. Even in cases where parents support education, the need for survival often takes priority. India also has a large population of orphaned children who live on the streets in urban areas and must earn wages for food.

Consequences of Child Labor

The biggest consequence associated with child labor is the continued cycle of poverty. Adults without education are at an increased risk for low-paying jobs, job insecurity, unemployment, and employment in hazardous industries.

Child laborers suffer from a variety of health and development issues due to exposure to dangerous substances or job requirements that put them in situations that may stunt their growth. For example, children who dig through dumps may be exposed to toxic chemicals that are discarded there. Children who are employed in textile factories may be required to operate machinery in a crouched position that does not allow them to stand up. Working long hours in such position takes a physical toll on their bodies.

Child labor in India also promotes the continuation of problematic social practices. Debt bonds occur when parents are loaned money and must sell their children into bonded labor in order to pay off the debt. Child trafficking is also common. Children in India are routinely kidnapped; in fact, an Indian child is abducted every eight minutes. About half of these children are never returned to their families. Sometimes these children are sold as sex slaves, but more often they are pressed into domestic service. Experts estimate that half a million children under the age of fifteen are employed as domestic labor in India.

Child labor also negatively impacts the overall wage and unemployment rates for adults in a community. It is estimated that, worldwide, about 75 million adults are unable to secure profitable employment because many of these positions are filled by poorly paid children.

Remedies and Efforts to End Child Labor Practices

The goal among child welfare advocates is to promote educational opportunities that will end the cycle of poverty that drives child labor practices. Prior to the passage of the 2010 Right to Education (RTE) Act, education was not compulsory for children in India. The RTE established the right to a free education at a local school. However, implementation of this legislation has been difficult and uneven, with accusations of poor funding and corruption. In addition, the RTE has been further hampered by India's lack of an existing national educational infrastructure and a limited pool of qualified teachers.

Studies have shown that education is only one aspect of the problem. Another is the lack of local jobs that make use of skilled workers at a reasonable rate of pay. In areas with industries that offer good-paying jobs, children are more likely to remain in school and have better opportunities as adults. For instance, between 1995 and 2003, those districts in India that saw the greatest increase in information technology (IT) jobs also experienced the greatest gains in school enrollment. Experts say this is because both the parents and the children began to understand the financial benefits of an education.

Another important avenue for ending child labor is enforcement of existing policies. Despite India's increased legislative commitment to ending child labor practices, between 2001 and 2011, child labor was only reduced by about 2.2 percent annually. Advocates recommend streamlining government agencies so that there is more cooperation and fewer institutional layers. Similarly, they advocate for harsher punishments for violators of existing child labor laws.

Finally, vocational curriculums that teach specific skillsets, and programs that allow children to both work and attend school simultaneously, have proven effective in providing children with alternatives to traditional education programs.

Bibliography

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Chopra, Geeta. "The Working and the Street Children: Where Is the Child?" From Child Rights in India: Challenges and Social Action. Springer, 2015. 101-34.

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International Labour Organization. World Report on Child Labour 2015. International Labour Organization, 2015, www.ilo.org/ipec/Informationresources/WCMS‗358969/lang--en/index.htm

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