The aim should be to ensure that all those children who are engaged in working should instead be attending school.
PESHAWAR: This is with reference to your editorial of June 13 titled “Child labour concerns” which was on World Day against Child Labour, commemorated on June 12.
Pakistan has ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989, the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Minimum Age Convention (C138) of 1973 and the ILO’s Worst Forms of Convention (C182), but ironically there are no up-to-date statistics on this issue in the country.
To date, only one child labour survey has been conducted – and that too long ago, in 1996. According to the survey, the number of children working in Pakistan was 3.3 million so it would be fair to say that the number would be significantly higher now. NGOs and researchers involved in this issue say that as many as 11-12 million children are now working in Pakistan and an estimated half of these are under ten years of age. After the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment, the provinces now have the authority to pass legislation on this very important subject but so far nothing has been done in this regard. The aim, clearly, should be to ensure that all those children who are engaged in working should instead be attending school.
I would urge the federal and provincial governments to conduct another survey so that the true extent of child labour as well as the number of street children can be ascertained. Once this information is at hand, more informed policies can be formulated and implemented. Apart from this, the provincial governments should adopt the Employment of Children Act of (ECA) 1991, and should add child labour to the list of banned occupation under the said law.
Furthermore, the system which inspects the prevalence of child labour should be strengthened and all provincial governments should ensure the implementation of Article 25A of the Constitution regarding the right to free and compulsory education for all children between the ages of five and 16 years.
Imran Takkar
Published in The Express Tribune, June 14th, 2013.
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