Child Labour: A Global Problem

It is believed that child labour is an integral part of the tragic socio-economic reality of India, a direct corollary of poverty and other economic deprivation, and that it cannot be eliminated in its entirety without eradicating parental poverty.

Child labour is a silent and tragic emergency of our times. The number of working children, and the scale of their suffering, increases year by year. Millions of children are forced to work, many in servitude and under extremely hazardous conditions. In fact, few human abuses are so unanimously condemned while being so universally practiced. By any objective measure this issue should rank high on the global agenda, but in practice it is surrounded by a wall of silence. Some estimates put the figure of children working worldwide at 100 to 200 million.

Studies show that child labour is not only confined to the developing countries, but that there are a growing number of working children in the industrialised nations as well.

Child labour exposes children to work under subhuman conditions, devoid of safety and protection. Everyday, they inhale toxic elements and harmful dust and fluff in glass works, match, firework and carpet factories and in mines and stone quarries. By the time they enter their teens, their physical condition makes them susceptible to a variety of diseases: partial blindness, respiratory disorders, musculo-skeletal problems and other grave disorders.