Child Labour Is Not a Necessary Evil – Telegraph Blogs 8/13/11 5:31 PM

Child labour is not a necessary evil – Telegraph Blogs 8/13/11 5:31 PM

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Peter Foster moved to Beijing in March 2009. He was formerly the Daily Telegraph's South Asia Correspondent based New Delhi from 2004-2008. He is married with three children.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peterfoster/3629781/Child_labour_is_not_a_necessary_evil/ Page 1 of 7 Child labour is not a necessary evil – Telegraph Blogs 8/13/11 5:31 PM

Child labour is not a necessary evil

By Peter Foster World Last updated: October 9th, 2006

1 Comment Comment on this article

Tomorrow an India-wide ban on the use of children as domestic servants and waiters in ‘dhabas’ (roadside restaurants) comes into force.

Child labourers at a rescue centre

Plenty of people have ridiculed the ban, saying it is unworkable – it is estimated there are 500,000 child workers in these occupations in Delhi alone – and pointed at the government’s pretty feeble plans to enforce it as further evidence of yet another pie-in-the sky paper initiative.

I disagree with the nay-sayers. The ban is an important statement of intent and a significant and welcome change from the age-old position that child labour is a ‘necessary evil’ given widespread poverty in Indian society.

Clearly in the real world child labour will not stop overnight – there aren’t the schools, hostels etc to accommodate and rehabilitate these children even if the government had the manpower to round them up – but it’s no bad thing to make a statement of intent.

It might also raise awareness and change attitudes among India’s new middle classes who, increasingly, find themselves needing double-incomes households, even after starting families.

However this often means hiring school-age girls from placement agencies, often for just 1,000 – 1,500 rupees a month.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peterfoster/3629781/Child_labour_is_not_a_necessary_evil/ Page 2 of 7 Child labour is not a necessary evil – Telegraph Blogs 8/13/11 5:31 PM

There are one or two excellent NGOs in Delhi who are devoted to mopping up the casualties of this system. In the worst cases these girls find themselves imprisoned in their master’s homes, denied wages, beaten, starved and even raped.

This, however, is rare. Most people in India, I believe, try to treat their servants well – but sometimes it doesn’t occur to them to ask whether they should be keeping school age children as domestic helps at all.

A case in point comes from an English friend who recently told me the story of a conversation with a female Indian colleague who spoke quite openly about her young Bengali servant-girl. What a great boon she was and how she enabled her to enjoy her freedom to work and enjoy a second income.

The point is that this woman – who incidentally had a PhD – didn’t seem to think there was anything wrong with this. The usual argument is seductive – better she’s working in Delhi for me than starving in a village outside Kolkata/Calcutta – but in the final analysis, wrong.

This new legislation makes that point very clearly Children should be studying, not working. It’s a lofty and laudable aim which shouldn’t be dismissed just because it isn’t achievable overnight.

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http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peterfoster/3629781/Child_labour_is_not_a_necessary_evil/ Page 4 of 7 Child labour is not a necessary evil – Telegraph Blogs 8/13/11 5:31 PM

sadashivan 09/11/2007 01:22 AM Child labor is a consequence of poverty as hunger, homeless and others so is not as easy as we think. Even NGO Report Recommend

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