World Day Against Child Labour, June 12

All over the world, millions of children are forced to toil in factories, mines, restaurants and many other places to earn a living for themselves and their families. Often they have to forego their education and recreation and work ceaselessly for their employers. It is very unfortunate that the kids' childhood is snatched by circumstances and they have to work for employers who burden them with physical, monotonous and sometimes, hazardous work for meager wages. Towards  the beginning of this century, ILO had acknowledged the suffering of these helpless children and formulated ways to help them out. The World Day Against Child Labour is the outcome of this concern expressed by the ILO towards child labour. The primary aim of WDACL is to bring the countries of the world together to make them aware of this issue of child labour and to plan ways to eradicate it. Every year, ILO puts forward a theme for combating child labour. The World Day Against Child Labour 2017 theme is “In conflicts and disasters, protect children from child labour”. In recent years around a billion people have been affected by conflicts in their countries and about one-third of those affected are children. Conflicts and wars as well as natural disasters have a devastating effect on the population of countries as residences and schools are destroyed. Many people have to flee their homes. They lose their livelihood and become victims of poverty and starvation. Often they are trapped in situations where their basic human rights are violated. Children are severely affected by conflicts as they are internally displaced or end up as refugees in other countries. Then they become vulnerable to evils of trafficking and child labour. The countries of the world are striving to end child labour by 2025. The ILO in collaboration with various international organisations relating to children’s, workers’ and human rights seeks to provide an important framework for legislation established by national governments. In India, 12 million child labourers constitute 11.8 % of the working population in spinning, textile and clothing, construction and domestic work. They are generally forced into this work due to poverty and lack of education. India has risen to this issue of child labour and is the taking the necessary actions. The Indian government has signed two covenants and has committed itself to reporting about their fight against child labour to the ILO. Thus, the world over, people are trying to put an end to child labour by framing strict laws to protect children from the suffering of exhaustive physical labour and to return to them their childhood.