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TheHindu:Kerala/KochiNews:Moststreetchildrenaremigrants:survey

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Saturday,Mar26,2005

Kerala
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Kerala Kochi

Moststreetchildrenaremigrants:survey
ByOurStaffReporter
KOCHI,MARCH25.Mostchildrenonthestreetsofthecity
aremigrantsandchildlabourthrivesinhotels.Theseare
someofthemajorfindingsofasurveyconductedaspart
of a programme for children at risk by the Cochin City
LevelForum.
The forum was constituted by the Social Welfare
DepartmentofKeralawiththecityMayorasitschairman
for developing an integrated programme for children at
risk.
The survey has also revealed that 40 per cent of these
migrant children are below six years old and 20 per cent
of them are aged between six and nine years. Parents of
these children are either beggars, street vendors or
construction labourers and live mainly on pavements,
publicplacesandconstructionsites.
The survey found that hotels are the most common place
that children find work in the city. About 10 per cent of
such children are aged below 15 years. Four per cent of
them are totally illiterate and half of them have dropped
outofschoolbeforeClassVIII.

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Ofthetotalchildrenworkinginhotels,eightpercenthave
no contact with their families. The work and lodging
conditions have been found to be unhygienic. As many as
71 per cent of the children in hotels stay with adult co
workers during the night amid poor living conditions at
the hotels and wear unclean clothes. Nine per cent of the
children work up to 16 hours, while 26 per cent work 13
hoursand25percentwork10hours.
Categories

The survey conducted by the People's Council for Social

Justice categorised the children at risk into migrant
children,workingchildren,slumchildrenandsexworker's
children to assess the children's risk factor. Most of the
migrants are from Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh while
childrenfromKeralaarefew.
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childrenfromKeralaarefew.

TheHindu:Kerala/KochiNews:Moststreetchildrenaremigrants:survey

Children of sex workers are an exploited lot because of

their vulnerable position in society, the survey said. In
Kerala, sex workers are not confined to an area but are
scatteredandhavespecificplacesofoperation.
Slums, which have become part of almost all towns and
cities, have become the breeding ground of antisocial
elements,thesurveysaid.Mostoftheparentsofchildren
in the slums are unemployed and this deprives the
children of proper economic, social and psychological
necessities,makingthemvulnerabletoalifeascriminals,
thesurveysaid.
The main objective of the survey is to promote rights of
children at risk and to reintegrate them into mainstream
society. It wants to ensure that children below 14 years
do not work in hotels and make these places a child
labourfree zone. Rehabilitation of children in temporary
shelters, sending them back to their homes, providing
medical care and basic literacy are some of the other
objectivesofthesurvey.
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