Sad truth is children are being trafficked in large numbers to work as bonded labourers. The faulty statistics mask the true picture
Deva Kumar (name changed), a 13-year-old boy from Gaya district in Bihar, was offered a job in a bangle factory in Hyderabad. The employer promised that he would be sending Rs 4000 per month to his family. Deva left for Hyderabad. Months went on. But Deva’s family did not receive a penny. After six months, Deva called his father saying he was made to work 16-18 hours a day all seven days a week. He was beaten badly if he dozed off in the dead of night. Realising Deva had been forced into child labour, his father, Ramesh Paswan, a daily wage labourer, visited a police station in Gaya to register a case against the trafficker. The police refused to register the FIR against the human trafficker. Paswan had to struggle for two months to get the case registered. He reached out to a lawyer-turned-child rights activist Neeraj Kumar Kashyap who went to the police station with him.
The latest Census 2011, although quite old, says that the number of working children in India in the age group 5-14 years is 10.1 million of which 5.6 million are boys and 4.5 million are girls. Child trafficking, both for sex and labour, is a horrific crime-plagued by poor statistics. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, in 2021, there were 2691 children rescued.
In law, child labour is prohibited. Yet, it continues to thrive. Across the country, there are a few sectors noted for high child labour employment: bangle factories, brick kilns, carpet weaving, domestic service, agriculture, fisheries and mining. Some sectors primarily engage children; others are largely dependent on them. Such sectors fuel the demand for children. The demands are met with trafficked children.
The trafficked children are sent to the sectors spread across the country, and in some cases to neighbouring countries. Bihar, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra are the main states in the country where child labour is present.
The number of children in child labour has risen to 160 million worldwide – an increase of 8.4 million children in the last four years – with millions more at risk due to the impacts of COVID-19, according to a new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and UNICEF released in 2021. The trafficked children invariably belong to the underprivileged sections of society. It is both a cause and consequence of poverty. Human traffickers give false hope to the parents for their children’s future before trafficking them.
I've worked in the anti-trafficking space for over 20 years. Last month, I spoke to the parents of nine rescued children. They said sending children to a government school is a waste of time and they cannot afford private schools. That is why they send them to work instead. Deva’s father, Ramesh Paswan is one such parent. At 13, Deva was a school dropout when he was trafficked. The progress on this case shows everything that needs fixing if we’re looking to solve the problem of child labour. Deva had come back with a broken neck. Other children who returned with him had injuries and cut marks all over their bodies. Before setting them free, the trafficker and his goons had beaten them. The local hospital had to send them to the district government hospital where they received treatment for five days before going home. Still, their trafficker- Jaidun- was at large two months after the registration of the FIR. The FIR in question highlights a bunch of issues; one, registering an FIR against a human trafficker by the victim of the parents is an uphill task, Second, even after registration of the case, the police do not take the case of human trafficking seriously, in this case, police did not go to Hyderabad to rescue them. Third, no compensation, by any government agencies, has been received by the child trafficking survivor even after the passing of a year. In the absence of any support from the government, rehabilitation becomes difficult.
Child labour is a demand-driven problem. The demands are met by the children of the most underprivileged sections or children experiencing difficult circumstances. The crime of child labour should be seen through the lens of organized crime by the police who should not oppose resistance in registering the case, rather police should work proactively. There are around 1000 children trafficked from Gaya and transported to Hyderabad to engage in bangle factories. The police have not visited Hyderabad, so far, to bust the racket and rescue the children enslaved in bangle factories. However, after the new set of FIRs, two more human traffickers were arrested.
Jaidun was arrested after two months. He has been in jail for over ten months. It shows how much money human traffickers make. With annual profits as high as $ 150 billion, it is the world’s third largest and most profitable crime industry after illicit drugs and arms trafficking, says an international study.
(The writer is the author of Child Trafficking: The Fight for Freedom)