According to This paper portrays the nature of child workers in India and seeks to

understand its many complexities. It looks at the definition of child labour, the extent of
its prevalence, the reasons why children work, and the occupations they are engaged in.
It outlines India’s position on international obligations, its expanding domestic laws,
and the tardy implementation of these laws. It examines some of the inherent cultural
constraints and the role of values and beliefs in perpetuating child labour. It analyses
the relationship between education and child workers, and a possible solution in the
form of compulsory education. The paper emphasises that child workers in India are
from the marginalized sections and do not work out of choice. It stresses that this
phenomenon is, above all, a problem for the children. The paper concludes by
advocating the need to discard attitudes that are discriminatory or rationalise abuse,
and the need to adopt a rights-based, child-centred approach to counter the increasing
number of child workers.

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Notes
1. 1.

Article 32.1 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. For the
full text of the Convention, see United Nations (1991).

2. 2.

According to the 1971 Census, there were 10.75 million working children in India.
By 1975, the estimate went up to about 15.1 million. According to the National
Sample Survey (NSS), there were 16.25 million child labourers by 1977–1978. The
1981 Census put the figure at 13.64 million. The Planning Department put the
figure at 17.36 million in 1983. The same year, the Operation Research Group,
Baroda, said it was 44 million. Around the same time, the Balai Data Bank,
Manila, put the figure at 111 million. The NSS figure was 17.5 million in 1987–
1989. In 1991, the Census showed 11.28 million working children. According to
UNICEF, there were between 75 and 90 million children under 14 years of age
who do not attend school. This was supported by the NSS figures for 1994, which
suggested that 90 million children do not attend school at the age group 6 to 14.

3. 3.

For a recent analysis of the problem of estimation, see Lieten (2005).

4. 4.

The carpet industry, in particular, has been a champion of the “nimble fingers”
theory. For an in-depth study of the carpet industry that debunks this theory, see
Levison, et al. (1996).
5. 5.

Global March against Child Labour, Mailing List e-mail, 17 January 2001. See
also the ILO website: www.ilo.org.

6. 6.

Almost 35% people are below the so-called poverty line. In 1990, 37% of the
urban population and 39% of the rural population was below the poverty line.
According to the Planning Commission’s estimates for 1993–1994, 32.4% of the
urban population and 37.2% of the rural population was below the poverty line.

7. 7.

Details of the declarations and conventions are available on the UN and ILO
websites. For details of ILO initiatives, see Mishra (2000, pp. 184–193); Bajpai,
(2003, pp. 193–203).

8. 8.

The new legislation referred here is an amendment to the 1986 Child Labour
Law. See Government of India (2006).

9. 9.

For a discussion on the caste system, see Ghurye (1969); see also Dumont (1970).

10. 10.

The analysis of the attitudes of the parents and social activists is based on Weiner
(1991, pp. 4–51, 203).

11. 11.

Kerala achieved a literacy rate of 94% for men and 86% for women (in 1995) with
a drop-out rate close to 0% (Weiner 1991, p. 177). However, not everybody agrees
that low literacy rates can explain the high incidence of child labour. Lieten
(2000, p. 2038) points out that some states which have a high literacy rate
continue to have a high child labour ratio, whereas some educationally backward
states have lower child labour ratio, perhaps due to “a failing demand for labour.”

12. 12.

Provisional figures for the 2001 Census show the overall literacy rate at 51%. For
males, it has increased to 76%; and for females, to 54%.

13. 13.
 For a discussion on the twin strategies of law and moral reform to achieve human
rights, see Jha (2004).

three years, or fine, or both.