AN Advocacy Workshop on Reducing Child Labour to mark World Day Against Child Labour organized by some NGOs reviewed the child labour situation in Bangladesh with funding support from both the Australian government and World Vision Australia. This year’s theme of the Day was ‘No to child labour and yes to quality education’ and speakers urged the government to support families; which are sending their children to work for livelihood to get them back to school. According to reports presented at the workshop, 35 percent of children drop out from schools before getting through class V is because they got to work to eat. A senior official of the government taking part in the workshop said the government is trying its best to help those children with limited resources in hand. It has taken initiative to provide 40,000 children from underprivileged families with Tk 2,000 per month either to return to schools or retain them in the classrooms. The other condition is that they can’t engage in marital relationships.
Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) survey clarified that 78 lakh children are engaged in economic activities in Bangladesh, out of which 32 lakh are child labours and 13 lakh are involved in hazardous work. The figure shows 17.4 percent of the children work in and around Dhaka. Survey by UNICEF and ILO in 2007 showed that 4.2 lakh children in the country were domestic workers and 83 percent of them are girls. Officials said people who employ children to domestic work do it because their labour is cheap and they cannot bargain. Rich people are taking advantage of poverty, social norms and practices and lack of their education.
Children deserve the right to quality education and good health, regardless of social status and economic background. To do it, they must be withdrawn from labour and send to schools. In circumstances where basic necessities such as food, clothing and medical care are scarce, education to children remains altogether neglected to their parents. The poverty situation compels most parents to send their children to work; this is the harsh truth in most cases. There is no denying of the fact that poor parents are not fully aware of the consequences of keeping their children uneducated. So awareness and financial support must work together to save those children, many of them may become worthy citizen provided they get fair education.
It is praiseworthy that initiative has been taken to give financial support to children with monthly assistance to send them to schools. But there should be more care at the same time to the fact that the money for poor children should not be misused and diverted to support political party workers and their dependents. There must be at least self-respect when misusing money for poor children may arise. Employers must also be bared from employing children to work and must pay for their education if found exploiting them.
