Refusing to accept the apathy and ignorance of children’s rights globally, Kailash outlined his dream by asserting, “My only aim in life is that every child is free to be a child; free to grow and develop; free to eat; sleep, see daylight; free to laugh and cry; free to play and learn; free to go to school, and above all free to dream.”
In today’s world, he said, “There is no greater violence than to deny the dreams of our children” and held that “the biggest crises knocking on the doors of humanity today are fear and intolerance.” Reiterating the power of education he said, “Rights, security and hope can only be restored through education”.
“Urgency in the key word. Adults can wait our time has passed, but children who’s time is here and now and in the future, can not wait,” was call from Mr Kailash Satyarthi.
Today, around 215 million children are employed throughout the world–many of them forced to work long hours as full-time laborers. In many developing nations, these children lack access to education, proper nutrition, and health care. Stripped of their right to a childhood in order to help their families put food on the table, more than half of them are fall prey to the worst forms of child labor, exposed to hazardous environments, slavery, drug trafficking and prostitution, and armed conflict. (source: united nations) official figures for india, alone, indicate there are over 12 million child laborers in the country. Though many ngos estimate that the more accurate figure is a staggering 60 million children, a majority of whom work in dhabas or roadside restaurants/hotels, and factories, specifically textiles and firecracker (matchstick) factories, where the conditions are appalling and hazardous. And while a 2006 law mandated that no child under fourteen work, like many laws in india, it is rarely enforced: two years after the ban, the labor ministry carried out 12,000 operations but made only 211 prosecutions.
According to unicef, state of the world’s children 2010, an estimated 12 percent of children in india ages 5-14 are engaged in child labor activities. Stripping these children of the right to education strips them of a chance to ever better themselves,
And instead perpetuates a vicious cycle that condemns them to a life of poverty, where they are forced to live without the basic human needs that many of us take for granted. And while it would would cost $760 billion over a 20-year period to end child labor, the estimated benefit is six times that—over $4 trillion in economies where child labor is prevalent (ilo, investing in every child, 2003).
ISSUES OF CONCERN
- CHILD LABOUR & RIGHT TO EDUCATION
- CHILD MARRIAGE
- CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES
- MISSING CHILDREN
- CHILDREN LIVING WITH AIDS
- CHILD LABOUR
- CHILD TRAFFICKING
- CHILDREN WITHOUT PARENTAL CARE
- CHILD HEALTH AND NUTRITION
- STREET CHILDREN
- CHILDREN IN POVERTY
- SEX-SELECTIVE ABORTION
- CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE
1. Child Labour & Right To Education
The worst forms versus all forms of child labour
Because many people mistakenly assume that child labour is a ‘necessary evil’, only the worst forms of child labour, such as prostitution and slavery, are usually addressed. Indeed, it is easy for everyone to agree that these should be abolished. But this does not help children who carry out work that is labelled as less harmful. About 70% of child workers work on the land or in the household. These children, too, are seriously damaged, although it is perhaps less visible. Sometimes they do go to school but also have to work before and after school or only in certain seasons, such as harvest time. But their performance at school can actually suffer from this, as can their health, well-being and future prospects.
It should also be borne in mind that child workers cannot be easily classified into groups. Children could still be doing other work. They could be working in a mine during part of the year and on the land during the harvest season. Even if it were possible to draw a dividing line between the worst forms of child labour and less severe forms of child labour, it would still be pointless. What’s more, children aren’t interested in these labels. Is it fair when a child who had to forge iron with glowing coals does eventually go to school while his sister at home who is supposedly doing less damaging work is overlooked? She, too, has a right to education. It is clear that focusing on the worst forms of child labour leads to ad hoc solutions, replaces one group of children with another group and simply perpetuates the problem. This is why Stop Child Labour is calling for the elimination of all forms of child labour that prevent children from getting an education.
Informal part-time versus regular full-time education
Focusing on the worst forms of child labour can also lead to a two-tier society in which children carrying out the worst forms of child labour are put into regular full-time education while children who continue to work informally are offered part-time (evening) education so that they can combine work and school. As long as it is assumed that children have to work to survive, this seems the highest goal attainable. But the quality of informal education often leaves much to be desired. Moreover, it is questionable how much children can actually learn after a hard day’s work. Ultimately, informal education does not truly help them and they remain disadvantaged in comparison to their more privileged peers who have regular full-time education.
An additional problem is that informal education by private organisations is more likely to be limited to temporary projects. When lenders withdraw, everything stops. Moreover, it takes the responsibility for education out of the government’s hands. Yet ultimately, only governments are capable of developing and providing a sustainable system of education for all children. The often moderate or poor quality of regular full-time education is not a reason to set up an alternative system for working children but a reason to improve the quality of the education system as a whole. This way, all children can benefit. Stop Child Labour believes that focusing on the worst forms of child labour offers no structural improvement. A more effective approach is to tackle all forms of child labour that prevent children from going to school at the community level and – together with the government – to ensure that all children can follow regular daytime classes.
International agreements and conventions
The above vision and promising practices are in fact a logical consequence of agreements made at the international level (UN). Under the “Convention on the Rights of the Child”, which has been ratified by most countries, states are required to provide compulsory and free primary education. In addition, states commit themselves under this convention to implement appropriate sanctions and other measures to ensure that children are protected from economic exploitation, dangerous work and work that hinders their participation in education.
There are two important ILO (International Labour Organisation) Conventions relevant to the fight against child labour. ILO Convention 182 against the Worst Forms of Child Labour prohibits dangerous and unhealthy work for children and adolescents up to 18 years of age. This Convention has now been ratified by 174 countries. ILO Convention 138 on the ‘minimum age for work’ states that the minimum age for work should not be lower than the age at which compulsory education ends, with a lower limit of 15 years of age. Developing countries may opt for a minimum of 14 years. The number of countries that have signed this convention has risen sharply in recent years and now stands at 1618.
As for universal education: 155 countries at the World Education Forum in Dakar in 2000 decided that by 2015 all children should have access to primary education. This is one of the generally accepted Millennium Development Goals which government leaders agreed on in 2000 to help rid the world of poverty.
When it comes to children’s rights in Africa it is also important to refer to the African Charter on the Rights of the Child. This charter obliges governments to take measures to protect and advance the rights of children – including the right to education and protection against child labour. It states that governments should protect children against harmful social and cultural practices. This includes all forms of work and practices, such as child marriage, that hinder children’s right to education.
This combined mandate gives rise to the basic premise: ‘Every child has the right to regular full-time education, and no child should carry out work that hinders that education and/or is dangerous’. The agreements and conventions provide clear guidelines for policy and programmes, but unfortunately they are not complied with in many countries. Stop Child Labour continues to refer to these agreements and conventions to call on governments to fulfil their responsibilities.
The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act or Right to Education Act (RTE), is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted on 4 August 2009, which describes the modalities of the importance of free and compulsory education for children between 6 and 14 in India under Article 21a of the Indian Constitution. India became one of 135 countries to make education a fundamental right of every child when the Act came into force on 1 April 2010.
The Act makes education a fundamental right of every child between the ages of 6 and 14 and specifies minimum norms in elementary schools. It requires all private schools to reserve 25% of seats to children (to be reimbursed by the state as part of the public-private partnership plan). Kids are admitted in to private schools based on economic status or caste based reservations. It also prohibits all unrecognised schools from practice, and makes provisions for no donation or capitation fees and no interview of the child or parent for admission. The Act also provides that no child shall be held back, expelled, or required to pass a board examination until the completion of elementary education. There is also a provision for special training of school drop-outs to bring them up to par with students of the same age.
The RTE Act requires surveys that will monitor all neighbourhoods, identify children requiring education, and set up facilities for providing it. The World Bank education specialist for India, Sam Carlson, has observed: “The RTE Act is the first legislation in the world that puts the responsibility of ensuring enrolment, attendance and completion on the Government. It is the parents’ responsibility to send the children to schools in the US and other countries.”
The Right to Education of persons with disabilities until 18 years of age is laid down under a separate legislation – the Persons with Disabilities Act. A number of other provisions regarding improvement of school infrastructure, teacher-student ratio and faculty are made in the Act.
Education in the Indian constitution is a concurrent issue and both centre and states can legislate on the issue. The Act lays down specific responsibilities for the centre, state and local bodies for its implementation. The states have been clamouring that they lack financial capacity to deliver education of appropriate standard in all the schools needed for universal education. Thus it was clear that the central government (which collects most of the revenue) will be required to subsidise the states.
A committee set up to study the funds requirement and funding initially estimated that INR 1710 billion or 1.71 trillion (US$38.2 billion) across five years was required to implement the Act, and in April 2010 the central government agreed to sharing the funding for implementing the law in the ratio of 65 to 35 between the centre and the states, and a ratio of 90 to 10 for the north-eastern states. However, in mid 2010, this figure was upgraded to INR 2310 billion, and the center agreed to raise its share to 68%. There is some confusion on this, with other media reports stating that the centre’s share of the implementation expenses would now be 70%. At that rate, most states may not need to increase their education budgets substantially.
A critical development in 2011 has been the decision taken in principle to extend the right to education till Class X (age 16) and into the preschool age range. The CABE committee is in the process of looking into the implications of making these changes.
The Ministry of HRD set up a high-level, 14-member National Advisory Council (NAC) for implementation of the Act. The members included Kiran Karnik, former president of NASSCOM; Krishna Kumar, former director of the NCERT; Mrinal Miri, former vice-chancellor of North-East Hill University; Yogendra Yadav – social scientist. India
Sajit Krishnan Kutty, Secretary of The Educators Assisting Children’s Hopes (TEACH) India; Annie Namala, an activist and head of Centre for Social Equity and Inclusion; and Aboobacker Ahmad, vice-president of Muslim Education Society, Kerala.
A report on the status of implementation of the Act was released by the Ministry of Human Resource Development on the one year anniversary of the Act. The report admits that 8.1 million children in the age group 6-14 remain out of school and there’s a shortage of 508,000 teachers country-wide. A shadow report by the RTE Forum representing the leading education networks in the country, however, challenging the findings pointing out that several key legal commitments are falling behind the schedule. The Supreme Court of India has also intervened to demand implementation of the Act in the Northeast. It has also provided the legal basis for ensuring pay parity between teachers in government and government aided schools. Haryana Government has assigned the duties and responsibilities to Block Elementary Education Officers–cum–Block Resource Coordinators (BEEOs-cum-BRCs) for effective implementation and continuous monitoring of implementation of Right to Education Act in the State.
It has been pointed out that the RTE act is not new. Universal adult franchise in the act was opposed since most of the population was illiterate. Article 45 in the Constitution of India was set up as an act: The State shall endeavour to provide, within a period of ten years from the commencement of this Constitution, for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of fourteen years.
As that deadline was about to be passed many decades ago, the education minister at the time, MC Chagla, memorably said: “Our Constitution fathers did not intend that we just set up hovels, put students there, give untrained teachers, give them bad textbooks, no playgrounds, and say, we have complied with Article 45 and primary education is expanding… They meant that real education should be given to our children between the ages of 6 and 14” – (MC Chagla, 1964).
In the 1990s, the World Bank funded a number of measures to set up schools within easy reach of rural ommunities. This effort was consolidated in the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan model in the 1990s. RTE takes the process further, and makes the enrolment of children in schools a state prerogative.
