NHRC directs states, UTs to provide reports on their actions to eradicate child labour

The National Human Rights Commission has demanded all states and Union Territories to provide reports on their actions to end child labour. The NHRC has taken a serious view of Rajasthan authorities' 'contradictory findings' in connection with a 2019 complaint alleging the 'rampant trafficking' of children in three districts. As a result, the NHRC has requested that all state secretaries and union territory administrators file a report detailing the steps taken to implement the provisions and articles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Child and Adolescent Labour (Amendment) Act 2016 in their respective jurisdictions, with a focus on the position of child labourers. 

All state and UT labour secretaries have been directed to file a report within eight weeks detailing legal action taken against companies and their management who employ children in their factory premises or use them for any production activity, in violation of the letter and spirit of the UN convention on the rights of the child. The National Human Rights Commission, in its statement, stated that despite various laws and schemes to protect children's rights, their bonded labour and trafficking, and the existence of child labour "raises a big question mark on the effectiveness of the state machinery to control the menace of child labour" even after seven decades of independence.

The Commission, in its statement, also noted that in 1988, the Union Labour & Employment Ministry had initiated the National Child Labour Projects (NCLP Scheme) to rehabilitate working children in 12 child labour endemic districts of the country. The scheme aimed to conduct surveys of Child Labour in hazardous occupations, identify and rehabilitate them by providing special schools syphoned health care facilities, vocational training and thus eliminate all forms of child labours.

NHRC issues reminder to Bengal's Secy to finish survey on Sonagachi sex workers' plight

Earlier last week, The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has issued a reminder to West Bengal's Secretary of Department of Women and Child Development and Social Welfare to expedite the work of conducting a survey along with the Indian Institute of Science over the conditions of victims of Sonagachi from social, legal and health point of view and submit the report within ten weeks. The reminder by the NHRC comes after it demanded a report from West Bengal's chief secretary on policies enacted to combat sex trafficking in Sonagachi, Asia's largest red-light district, in May 2021.

Image Credit: ANI

(With PTI Inputs)