While a few cases of child labour come to the fore through media, more numbers go unreported. The actual number of child labourers in the State is much higher than the available data, said law Minister Arun Kumar Sahoo on the occasion of the World Day against Child labour on Friday. Addressing a meeting marking observance of the day here, the Minister stressed that complete elimination of child labour is possible only by understanding the situation of a child in which she/he was forced to become a labourer and addressing the issue through appropriate means.
On the occasion, the People’s Cultural centre (PECUC) and National Centre for Child Rights (NCCR) organised a public discourse on ‘Elimination of Child labour through Quality Education-Reality, Challenges and Prospects’ here. PECUC Secretary and NCCR Chairman Ranjan Mohanty said education can be prerequisite for eliminating child labour. He informed that the number of child labour is reducing at a very slow pace. The reduction rate is 2.2 per cent per year, he added. OPEPA State Project Director Mahendra Mallick briefed about various Government interventions to reduce child labour and to increase school attendance.