CHILD AND ADOLESCENT LABOUR

 

For: Preliminary & Mains

Topic covers: Child labour – Current status & findings, related laws

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News Flash

An analysis of child labour cases in Kerala, by Childline, has thrown up a disturbing trend of persistent flouting of regulations governing the rights of adolescent labour.

International Day Against Child Labour: 12 June

 

Highlights

The actual number of child labour cases has shown a marginal fall from 142 in 2017-18 to 139 in the 2018-19 fiscal going by the analysis.

But, this data is restricted to only those cases brought to the notice of the agency through Child Helpline No. 1098, leaving out countless unreported instances of child labour.

 

Childline’s Findings

• Childline’s own analysis shows that the provisions of the Child and Adolescent Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 continued to be flouted with impunity in the case of adolescents, aged between 14 and 18, who are permitted to be enlisted for non-hazardous work.
• The Act stipulates that adolescents should not be employed for more than seven hours, the provision was found violated.
• The analysis found as many as 25 cases of mental harassment and six cases of physical harassment, whereas in 23 cases adolescents had no mandatory resting period, and in 22 cases they were made to work without weekly off.
• Wage was found paid in cash in 29 cases as against the mandated payment through bank account, while in 13 cases payment went to others, and a few were without pay for three months.
• The analysis found that more than half the rescued children / adolescents were from other States.
• Boys outnumbered girls by 125 to 14 when it came to child labour.
• An increasing trend in the employment of children was found in cities like Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram, though the actual number of child labour cases in Ernakulam district dropped to 17 from the previous year’s high of 38.

 

The Child and Adolescent Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986

Child: “child” means a person who has not completed his fourteenth year of age or such age as may be specified in the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 (35 of 2009), whichever is more.

Adolescent: “adolescent” means a person who has completed his fourteenth year of age but has not completed his eighteenth year.

 

• No child shall be employed or permitted to work in any occupation or process.
• A child can helps his family or family enterprise, which is other than any hazardous occupations or processes set forth in the Schedule, after his school hours or during vacations;
• A child can works as an artist in an audio-visual entertainment industry, including advertisement, films, television serials or any such other entertainment or sports activities except the circus, subject to such conditions and safely measures, as may be prescribed.
• No adolescent shall be employed or permitted to work in any of the hazardous occupations.
• The period of work on each day shall be so fixed that no period shall exceed three hours and that no adolescent shall work for more than three hours before he has had an interval for rest for at least one hour.
• No adolescent shall be permitted or required to work between 7 p. m and 8 a.m.
• No adolescent shall be required or permitted to work overtime.
• No adolescent shall be required or permitted to work in any establishment on any day on which he has already been working in another establishment.
• Every adolescent employed in an establishment shall be allowed in each week, a holiday of one whole day, which day shall be specified by the occupier in a notice permanently exhibited in a conspicuous place in the establishment and the day so specified shall not be altered by the occupier more than once in three months.

 

Source: The Hindu

 

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