Child Labour

If we are to talk of child labour, let's be fair and square here. I cannot presume that child to be better off with the hours of work he or she puts in instead of going to school, to play or anywhere else for that matter. The food , shelter, clothing that we as their 'masters' provide them with during their course of work , and the constant scrutiny in which they live in may not necessarily save them from delinquency either.When a mere child is handed over the responsibility of manual labour , that very child grows up in an environment that is beyond any suited conventions emotionally, psychologically and physically. Or are they to put up with it, because they do not belong to the same economic or social class that deserves egalitarianism.

Europe not before long had the concept of Au Pair , where an educated adult, helped with household chores in exchange for shelter. These young women mainly did so in search of residence during their course of education abroad.

However, a child who technically belongs to the dependency group in an economy, in a way takes up the job of an adult who could have been employed instead of him. Not only is he easy on the employers, he wouldn't demand much in terms of working hours or compensation for the work done, as long as you keep him diverted.

My point is how are we to blame as a society. Let us not divulge into government policies , technical help or foreign organisations. The concept of child labour comes up because of the way we live, the way we are programmed to function.Coming to my first argument about the assumption that child labours are better off, working somewhere, I would like to point out that if we cannot contribute to the child's development that was taking place in his native environment, who are we to vanquish it. In our economy, which is fairy market driven, the demand for children as workers has risen , hence the migration of children from their native places has risen. Their parents might be helpless, but we certainly aren't. When an empowered body refuses to look out for the dis-empowered, we cannot expect our society to move any further. With this I rest my case.