How child labour is being kept under wraps in India
Cut to Kailash Nagar in East Delhi where some 50,000 children are engaged in thread cutting of jeans. They get 40 paisa per piece for thread cutting and 75 paisa for packing. These children don't work in any factory or production unit, neither do they go to fetch work.
- May 24, 2015,
- Updated May 27, 2015 3:42 PM IST
On the 40 km Bundi-Bhilwara stretch of National Highway 76, it seems like business as usual till a man in a yellow T-shirt arrives on a motorbike at an eatery stall near Patiyal village, Bundi district. On his instructions, a group of children, chiseling small sandstones on the side of the highway, scatter. Some sneak into the huts behind the rubble, while others grab a cola-bar at the stall. The children are immediately replaced by a handful of women who carry on with the same work. Soon, an Innova stops near the stall on the highway and an expat is taken around the site by a couple of men. The team spends around 10 minutes at the spot. The expat is accompanied back to the vehicle and, after a brief discussion with the men, is driven away. Within minutes of his leaving, the children emerge from the huts and resume their work.
There is a precision with which the entire sequence is staged, almost as if it is enacted on a regular basis. The expat is a journalist from Belgium. He is investigating whether ethically sourced sandstone from the region was used to rebuild two of the most strategic commercial landmarks - Korenmarkt and Emile Braun Square - in the historical centre of Ghent, Belgium. Also visiting the area is a team of international buyers from Belgium who fund projects and NGOs to make sure that they are working towards buying ethically sourced stones - it implies good working practices in the mines and quarries, minimum safety standards and, above all, no child labour. The sandstone importers from the region include leading companies from Europe that manufacture natural stone and landscaping products such as Beltrami, Brett, CED, DNS Stones, Hardscape, London Stone, Marshalls, Natural Paving and Pavestone, among others. Indeed, as per estimates, approximately 280,000 tonnes of Indian sandstone is shipped to the UK alone. At last count, there were at least 10 such active NGOs working on the 40-odd km belt.
Observers feel that the current law, Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986, which prohibits the engagement of children in certain types of occupations and regulates the conditions of work in others, is outdated and should keep up with the times. The Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2012 was cleared by the Cabinet on May 13. The biggest grey area with respect to the amendment is that a child, after school hours, can help his family in fields, home-based work or forest gathering.
Majority of children fall under this category. Consider the example of agriculture and allied services that make for 14 per cent of India's GDP and engage maximum number of children. Enakshi Thukral, Co-Director, HAQ Centre for Child Rights, says that our attitude to the existence of child labour is indifferent and unless it is visibly hazardous we think it is normal and even find excuses for it.
In Bihar's Samastipur district alone, about 25,000 children are involved in the tobacco producing value chain, according to Dilip Kumar Giri, Vice President of the Bihar unit of Bachpan Bachao Andolan. "Most of these children are enrolled in schools and regularly attend school. The biggest attraction for them and their families is the mid-day meal. Free dress and scholarship for backward and extremely backward castes is also a big draw. Before going to the school and after coming back from the school they engage in tobacco production," he says. India is the third-largest producer of tobacco in the world after China and Brazil. Indeed, one of the biggest problems globally in the tobacco supply chain has been the use of child labour. Tobacco and tobacco products contribute about Rs 20,000 crore to the exchequer by way of excise duty. India earned $833.42 million in 2011/12 and $1.01 billion in 2013/14 from tobacco exports.
According to the ICAR-Central Tobacco Research Institute, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar accounts for 0.20 lakh hectare of tobacco production in the country. Locals say that almost 70 per cent the economy of Samastipur, 60 per cent of Vaishali and 40 per cent of Muzaffarpur depends on tobacco. Pramod Kumar, sarpanch of Satanpur in Samastipur district, explains that most of the processes in production are outsourced and so it's the contractors who use child labour. This labour comes cheap. For example, a contractor pays Rs 5,000 to children for clearing weeds in one-acre plantation but would have to shell out around Rs 8,500 for adult labourers. Similarly, after harvesting is done by the adults, children are used by contractors to acquire the plants. Usually, a child is paid only Rs 20 to Rs 30 for the job while adults are paid Rs 150 to Rs 200. Going by thumb rule, one acre produces 10 quintals of tobacco. By using child labour on every acre, Rs 20,000 is saved. Contractors and farmers insist that if they stop using child labour, their profits will shrink drastically, as all the cost is saved at the labour end only, be it at the farming stage or the processing stage.
In 2010, the US Ministry of Commerce reportedly wrote to the Indian government that the Obama administration was considering a ban on imports of granite and sandstone from India, as mines in Rajasthan were violating international labour standards. However, experts say child-labour-free cobbles is not a solution; it is a band-aid approach to a deeper issue.
"The buyers want to label the stone as ethically sourced without stipulating conditions to their Indian business counterparts. They should be ready to a pay a premium even if it means to cut down their profit marginally, to cobbles made legally and under proper work conditions," says Sengupta . Their insistence on ensuring child-labour-free products is only making the situation worse. "Today, the children are trained by their employees to deny that they make cobbles. Their parents are threatened to say that they have no debt, no health issues and their children go to school when the reality is the opposite."
Meanwhile, the civil society hails the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill as a step in the right direction. But whether things will change on the ground remains to be seen, considering the socio-economic realities in India.
(RESEARCH INPUTS BY NITI KIRAN)
On the 40 km Bundi-Bhilwara stretch of National Highway 76, it seems like business as usual till a man in a yellow T-shirt arrives on a motorbike at an eatery stall near Patiyal village, Bundi district. On his instructions, a group of children, chiseling small sandstones on the side of the highway, scatter. Some sneak into the huts behind the rubble, while others grab a cola-bar at the stall. The children are immediately replaced by a handful of women who carry on with the same work. Soon, an Innova stops near the stall on the highway and an expat is taken around the site by a couple of men. The team spends around 10 minutes at the spot. The expat is accompanied back to the vehicle and, after a brief discussion with the men, is driven away. Within minutes of his leaving, the children emerge from the huts and resume their work.
There is a precision with which the entire sequence is staged, almost as if it is enacted on a regular basis. The expat is a journalist from Belgium. He is investigating whether ethically sourced sandstone from the region was used to rebuild two of the most strategic commercial landmarks - Korenmarkt and Emile Braun Square - in the historical centre of Ghent, Belgium. Also visiting the area is a team of international buyers from Belgium who fund projects and NGOs to make sure that they are working towards buying ethically sourced stones - it implies good working practices in the mines and quarries, minimum safety standards and, above all, no child labour. The sandstone importers from the region include leading companies from Europe that manufacture natural stone and landscaping products such as Beltrami, Brett, CED, DNS Stones, Hardscape, London Stone, Marshalls, Natural Paving and Pavestone, among others. Indeed, as per estimates, approximately 280,000 tonnes of Indian sandstone is shipped to the UK alone. At last count, there were at least 10 such active NGOs working on the 40-odd km belt.
Observers feel that the current law, Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986, which prohibits the engagement of children in certain types of occupations and regulates the conditions of work in others, is outdated and should keep up with the times. The Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2012 was cleared by the Cabinet on May 13. The biggest grey area with respect to the amendment is that a child, after school hours, can help his family in fields, home-based work or forest gathering.
Majority of children fall under this category. Consider the example of agriculture and allied services that make for 14 per cent of India's GDP and engage maximum number of children. Enakshi Thukral, Co-Director, HAQ Centre for Child Rights, says that our attitude to the existence of child labour is indifferent and unless it is visibly hazardous we think it is normal and even find excuses for it.
In Bihar's Samastipur district alone, about 25,000 children are involved in the tobacco producing value chain, according to Dilip Kumar Giri, Vice President of the Bihar unit of Bachpan Bachao Andolan. "Most of these children are enrolled in schools and regularly attend school. The biggest attraction for them and their families is the mid-day meal. Free dress and scholarship for backward and extremely backward castes is also a big draw. Before going to the school and after coming back from the school they engage in tobacco production," he says. India is the third-largest producer of tobacco in the world after China and Brazil. Indeed, one of the biggest problems globally in the tobacco supply chain has been the use of child labour. Tobacco and tobacco products contribute about Rs 20,000 crore to the exchequer by way of excise duty. India earned $833.42 million in 2011/12 and $1.01 billion in 2013/14 from tobacco exports.
According to the ICAR-Central Tobacco Research Institute, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar accounts for 0.20 lakh hectare of tobacco production in the country. Locals say that almost 70 per cent the economy of Samastipur, 60 per cent of Vaishali and 40 per cent of Muzaffarpur depends on tobacco. Pramod Kumar, sarpanch of Satanpur in Samastipur district, explains that most of the processes in production are outsourced and so it's the contractors who use child labour. This labour comes cheap. For example, a contractor pays Rs 5,000 to children for clearing weeds in one-acre plantation but would have to shell out around Rs 8,500 for adult labourers. Similarly, after harvesting is done by the adults, children are used by contractors to acquire the plants. Usually, a child is paid only Rs 20 to Rs 30 for the job while adults are paid Rs 150 to Rs 200. Going by thumb rule, one acre produces 10 quintals of tobacco. By using child labour on every acre, Rs 20,000 is saved. Contractors and farmers insist that if they stop using child labour, their profits will shrink drastically, as all the cost is saved at the labour end only, be it at the farming stage or the processing stage.
In 2010, the US Ministry of Commerce reportedly wrote to the Indian government that the Obama administration was considering a ban on imports of granite and sandstone from India, as mines in Rajasthan were violating international labour standards. However, experts say child-labour-free cobbles is not a solution; it is a band-aid approach to a deeper issue.
"The buyers want to label the stone as ethically sourced without stipulating conditions to their Indian business counterparts. They should be ready to a pay a premium even if it means to cut down their profit marginally, to cobbles made legally and under proper work conditions," says Sengupta . Their insistence on ensuring child-labour-free products is only making the situation worse. "Today, the children are trained by their employees to deny that they make cobbles. Their parents are threatened to say that they have no debt, no health issues and their children go to school when the reality is the opposite."
Meanwhile, the civil society hails the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill as a step in the right direction. But whether things will change on the ground remains to be seen, considering the socio-economic realities in India.
(RESEARCH INPUTS BY NITI KIRAN)