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Human rights panel to set up task force to fight child labour

Terming child and bonded labour as the 'worst manifestation of inhumanity,' the National Human Rights Commission has decided to constitute a special task force to deal with this problem rampant in the carpet industry of Uttar Pradesh.

The commission, in its review meeting with officials of Uttar Pradesh, has taken serious note of the fact that in the carpet-belt of Mirzapur, Bhadoi and Jaunpur, where about 150,000 child workers are engaged, the enforcement of laws against this social evil was ineffective, NHRC sources said in New Delhi on Sunday.

It said the task force, with specially-empowered subdivisional magistrates exclusively dealing with the problem, would take all steps aimed at both sensitising the employers to the moral and legal issues involved in child labour and effectively enforce the laws.

Appreciating the measures taken by the Bhadhoi district authorities in the enforcement of laws against the scourge of child labour, the NHRC directed the Uttar Pradesh government to immediately commence similar initiatives in the districts of Mirzapur, Allahabad, Varanasi and Jaunpur.

Highlighting the various lacunae in the enforcement of the laws, the commission's special rapporteur pointed out how the 'germs of self-destruction' were planted in the very prosecution papers and the whole exercise of prosecuting the offender seem to lack willingness and commitment on the part of the law enforcement agencies.

Though the officials present at the meeting shared the concern of the commission, the NHRC was of the opinion that the magnitude of the problem, issues of social inequity underlying child and bonded labour, and the embarrassment caused to the dignity and self-respect of the country at the international level owing to the continued neglect of the obligations of the state to protect the rights of the child were not fully appreciated in the proper context and their true dimensions.

The commission felt that attempts at oversimplifying of the issues or rationalisation of the problem was just not permissible.

The district magistrate of Bhadoi, however, assured that the administration would vigorously enforce the laws against engagement of child and bonded labour in their true letter and spirit.

The sources said the discussion left the commission with the impression that the magnitude of the foreign-exchange supposedly earned by the carpet industry was a factor that somehow lingered in the back of the mind of the administration in dealing with the scourge of child and bonded labour.

The commission made it clear that child and bonded labour are 'great injustice' in themselves and the worst manifestation of inhumanity and human rights violation, and that no other consideration should hinder determined efforts to eradicate this scourge.

In the course of the discussion as to the magnitude of the problem prevalent in the carpet-belt, the commission felt that the official estimates did not correspond to the realities of the public and international perceptions in that behalf.

The commission has asked Labour Commissioner Sunanda Prasad to submit a report to it about augmentation of the enforcement procedures.

It said the entire responsibility for carrying out the enforcement of the laws against child and bonded labour would be that of the labour commissioner of the state.

Since the commission was discharging its supervisory role under the directions of the Supreme Court, the authorities of the state would take effective steps to enforce the laws so that the commission was enable to place before the apex court the progress made by the state government in enforcing the laws, the sources said.

The commission also requested its special rapporteur Chaman Lal to visit these districts to see that initiatives suggested by it were put it position promptly.

Kailash Satyarthi of the South Asian Coalition on Child Servitude, who was present at the meeting, however, aired a strong grievance against what he perceived as the lackadaisical attitude of the administration which the human rights activists of the area were confronted with, at the ground level.

He vividly described the travails and difficulties of the human rights activists who had to run from pillar to post to garner support of the official machinery in the efforts to locate and rescue children and bonded labour employed by the carpet manufactures.

He stated that he had a list of more than 700 such cases which he would handover to the district administration, if an assurance was forthcoming that the names would not reach the employers in advance owing to the leakage of information at lower levels of the official machinery.

He stated that when activists of the child rights sought magisterial and police assistance in the rescue work, the assistance was in a spirit of unwillingness and reluctance and just a constable or two would be deployed in an operation where the activists had to confront the might of well-organised manufactures.

UNI