Kailash Satyarthi seeks urgent steps to rescue child labourers during lockdown

NEW DELHI: Nobel Peace laureate Kailash Satyarthi wants the government to constitute an inter-ministerial task force to formulate and implement a strong action plan for combating the sudden spike in child trafficking once some semblance of normalcy is restored in the post Covid-19 period.
Satyarthi cites the terrible state of child labourers caught in the confines of factories, brick kilns and workshops in the ongoing lockdown and that many of these children are struggling with hunger in the absence of food.
In this backdrop, in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Satyarthi makes an unusual suggestion. He asks that a special notification be issued to give three months’ impunity to all employers of child labourers from prosecution or other punitive action should they voluntarily release children confined inside factories, workshops, stone quarries, brick kilns or other work places during this period.
"The demand for a notification to give impunity to employers of child labourers for three months is the last thing that I would have ever thought in my life. Extraordinary situations call for extraordinary steps and I strongly feel that in order to save the lives of lakhs of children trapped in slavery and child labour across the country, this step is the only option left now," Satyarthi stated in the letter.
He goes on to point that his deep sense of anguish is triggered by the recent case of death of a 12-year-old trafficked girl, Jamlo Makdam. "The desperate girl, while walking 150 kms, from a red chilli plantation in Telangana where she worked as a child labourer back to her village in Chhattisgarh died due to hunger just one hour short of her destination," Satyarthi pointed out.
"Earlier, children trapped as labour would not be paid their full wages and now they are not being provided food. The employers have fled to the safety of their own homes. These children, who work in factories located in Jaipur, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi and other cities, were trafficked from different states and forced into labour," Satyarthi shared.