World Day Against Child Labour

“In this month we are celebrating World Day Against Child Labour.

But many of us doesn’t know about the reason, why we celebrate this day every year. So we will let you know about this.”

The International Labour Organization (ILO) launched the World Day Against Child Labour in 2002 to focus attention on the global extent of child labour and the action and efforts needed to eliminate it.

Each year on 12 June, the World Day brings together governments, employers and workers organizations, civil society, as well as millions of people from around the world to highlight the plight of child labourers and what can be done to help them.

But before we talk about the condition of child labour,

let us know what it actually means.

Child labour: What it means

Not all work done by children should be classified as child labour that is to be targeted for elimination. Children's or adolescents' participation in work that does not affect their health and personal development or interfere with their schooling, is generally regarded as being something positive.

This includes activities such as helping their parents around the home, assisting in a family business or earning pocket money outside school hours and during school holidays. These kinds of activities contribute to children's development.

It refers to work that:

a) is mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous and harmful to children.

b) interferes with their schooling by depriving them of the opportunity to attend school; obliging them to leave school prematurely; or requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with excessively long and heavy work.

Child labour statistics

· 10.13 million child labourers between 5-14 years in India (2011 census data)

· Child labour in 2011 has decreased by around 20 percent from 2001 census figures

· There are 22.87 million working children in India between 15-18 years

· As per 2011 census, one in 11 children are working in India (5-18 years)

· 80 percent of the child labour in India is concentrated in rural areas

· ILO 2016 data indicates that there are 152 million working children in the world between 5-17 years, of which 23.8 million children are in India

· So 16 percent of the working children (or every 6th working child) in this age group is in India

Initiatives taken by the government to prevent child labour

Over the past two decades, India has put in place a range of laws and programmes to address the problem of child labour.

1. In 1979, the central government formed the first statutory committee to analyse and research on the issue of child labour in India - the Gurupadswamy committe. One of their major observations was that the problem of child labour is inextricably linked to poverty.

Taking into account the findings and recommendations of the Gurupadswamy committee, the union government enacted the child labour (Prohibition and & Regulation) Act in 1986.

The act prohibited children from being employed in specified hazardous occupations and at the same time regulated their working condition in other non-hazardous occupations and processes.

It is the need of todays society to stop child labour for better future of the world. Try to give your as much as possible contribution to stop this.