The Less Fortunate Ones

On a warm sunny day in Kolkata, I was on a road side tea stall near a bus stop, waiting for a friend, cursing myself, that why I came on time when I know that he going to be late, as usual. That was the second cup of tea I just finished. Thinking that taking another cup would be a little difficult, given the fact that the brightest star in our solar system was in mood that day.

While checking the clock, which read 2:15pm, I saw something which forced me to see things differently. I saw a little boy, probably eight or nine, sweeping the pavement of cigarette butts and other things thrown beside the stall. He would definitely be eightyish. The boy was holding the stick broom with both the hands. The broom seemed too fat for his little palms. I was looking at him, but he seemed to be concentrated on what he was doing.

I remembered that I saw this boy few times before in the stall, but never saw him sweeping. The effort he was putting into the work, is something that I cannot explain. The scorching heat was making it worse for him. I’m sure that it wouldn’t have taken more than five minutes to complete the work, but may be not to the poor boy.

As I was watching the boy working, Leonardo DiCaprio starrer movie, Blood Diamond came into my mind. The movie showcased the very sensitive topic of child soldiers of Africa. At that time, I felt that how different was that boy from the child soldiers, shown in the movie. He too is living away from his family. He too is doing something which he never thought or wished.

That day after I reached home I tried to Google a few statistics to get a rough picture. The numbers were as horrific as the issue itself. According to the statistics given by the Indian government there are around 20 million child labourers in the country, while other agencies claim that it is well over than 50 million.

Questions come into mind that what would be this child’s future. Well I guess no one knows what future beholds, but from our part we do our best so that we can the best that life has to offer. But who will offer a future to this child. Whom should he ask? Is the government doing enough? The law says that a child below fourteen years of age should not be employed, or should not be working for anybody, unless the place where he/she is working is owned by his/her family. That is where the loop hole is. People who employ these children in their shops or houses as helping hands, mentions that the child is their distant relative, and can easily escape the law.

Statistics show that every developed or developing nation puts at least 5% of its GPA towards its health sector and at least another 3-4% towards education. India on an average allocates 3% towards health and another 2% towards education. Experts say that a nation can never develop if it is not paving the future for the next generation. So is the government trying or is it pushing the nation into more misery by not allocating the required funds for development. How will the government justify the enormously huge investment in the defence sector? Most certainly a nation like India needs to investment a lot in the defence sector due recent terror strikes against the country. But still somehow it is better to educate the next generation than to be left alone for religious clerics to brain wash the young minds.

Child labour is not a new thing. Perhaps, it is being practiced in India since centuries. But if everybody wants, they can do their bits, in helping these less privileged ones. Like providing details of a child labour, to the police might not as effective a measure as it would be by getting in touch with an NGO who thinks about these less privileged children.

Different modes of communication have made our world a lot smaller now. We can also report an incident via email to the NGOs working to curb the child labour issue in India. We can raise our voice against the child labour in online blogs. Sensitising the issue should be a priority.