15 ,July 2019
Child labour refers to the employment of children in any work that deprives children of their childhood, interferes with their ability to attend regular school, and that is mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous and harmful. It is a serious problem from many decades and a challenge for many developing countries. It has existed over the centuries not only in the impoverished areas of developing countries but also in developed countries until the beginning of the 20th century. Many countries have enacted various laws and have taken serious initiative to eradicate child labour, yet still the problem is very widespread throughout the world. The problem of child labour appears in severe form and various factors are involved with it. The causes for the incidence of child labour in India are complex and deeply rooted into the society. Poverty seems to be the main cause. Child labour can be found in both urban and rural areas, However the vast majority of child labour occurs in rural areas since poverty is more rampant. Although many poor rural families struggle for a better life in urban areas, this pushes families to force their children to work in order to increase the family income and ensure survival.
Impact of child labour on legal environment
The Convention concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Action
for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour, adopted by the International Labour
Organization (ILO) in 1999 and ratified by 174 countries, prohibits hazardous labour for
children under the age of 18. Prohibited work includes work with dangerous machinery or in
dangerous locations, work that exposes children to physical, psychological, or sexual abuse,
and work with hazardous substances, agents, or processes. Despite the widespread acceptance
of this prohibition, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has estimated that 115
million children aged 5–17 years engage in hazardous work annually. Much of this work occurs
in developing countries with poor regulatory oversight, where children have limited access
to health care or basic information on health risks and preventive measures.
The
international organizations have made great efforts to eliminate child labour across the
world. Many countries have adopted legislation to prohibit child labour; nonetheless child
labour is widespread throughout the world. It is not easy task for low income countries to
achieve banning child labour. Several studies and international organizations considered
that education is the key strategy in addressing child labour, and it can help children to
stay away from work. However not every family can afford to send their children to school
or, even if they enrolled, afford to keep them attending the school.
CONCLUSION
Children are active in a wide variety of tasks and appear to substitute between them easily. Thus, if a child is observed working less in one task one cannot assume that she is working less. Moreover, though wage work appears less likely to be 70 associated with simultaneous schooling, differences in schooling associated with variation in hours worked are much greater than those associated with location of work. Work is typically classified as market work or domestic work. Domestic work is too often ignored in child time allocation studies. For a given number of hours worked, domestic work appears as likely as work in the farm or family business to trade off with school. Hence, studies of child labour need to consider as wide a range of activities as the data permit. There is considerable scope for learning about total labour supply or schooling changes by looking at changes in participation in various disaggregate activities. There is some evidence that child time allocation is influenced by the net return to schooling. While estimating the return to schooling is a challenge, there is suggestive evidence 71 that it influences child time allocation. Several studies document a correlation between the employment opportunities open to children inside and outside their household and child time allocation. Hence, there should be situations when work is the most efficient use of child time, and there is nothing in the literature which precludes this.
Therefore we need to work towards a better and cohesive society and eliminate evils like child labour from the society and Lloyd Law College follows a strict anti-slavery or human trafficking or child labour policy and does not tolerate it in any form and is ever vigilant and ready to keep the institution completely bereft of such systemic evils. Lloyd Law College, law colleges ranking in india, has committed itself to the implementation and enforcement of diverse methods of control in order to ensure compliance to the basic human edicts of not employing either, directly or indirectly, any person or individual who has been brought to be employed through the methods of slavery, bonded labour or human trafficking. The College has a very strict “No Child Labour Policy”.
Author
Law Faculty,
Lloyd Law College