Child labour in Pakistan

Bilal Asif

Pakistan as a nation is a developing country and consequently she faces a wide array of social problems in which child labour is a social issue within Pakistan and is considered a violation of human rights by the United Nations. In Pakistan children aged 5-14 are above 40 million. During the last year, the Federal Bureau of Statistics released the results of its survey funded by ILO’s IPEC (International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour). The findings were that 3.8 million children age group of 5-14 years are working in Pakistan out of total 40 million children in this age group; fifty percent of these economically active children are in age group of 5 to 9 years. Even out of these 3.8 million economically active children, 2.7 million were claimed to be working in the agriculture sector. Two million and four hundred thousand (73%) of them were said to be boys. Pakistani society is such that, a poor child can quite conveniently be deprived of basic education, only to feed the rest of his family members.

Anyone up to the age of 18 is a child and his basic right is to receive education and proper upbringing rather than use his hands to destroy his own bright future. Children are especially exploited in third world countries as they are a cheap source of labour and Pakistan children are used as labourers in the sports industry, carpet industry and the footwear and in glassware production. According to the Federal Bureau of Statistics of Pakistan, 3.3 million out of 40 million children are working in various industries, although child labour is strictly banned by law.

Child labour is a serious social problem within Pakistan because the future and progress of any country depends on an educated and enlightened youth and if a child is not properly socialised then s/he will not be able to grow as confident and literate citizen.

There are various reasons for exploitation of children within the economic sector of Pakistan and such causes are directly related to the major social problems of Pakistan.

Sociological variables as the causes of child labour in Pakistan

The factors that generate child labour within Pakistan are parental poverty and illiteracy; a careless political system; social and economic pressures; lack of education. Social attitudes in Pakistan due to which a child is considered an adult at settle down an early stage due to biological changes, also are a cause of exploitation of children below 18 years. Poverty is a major social issue within Pakistan and as a result children are made to work in various industries in order to support their financially poor parents. The status of the family directly influences the choices available to a child and obviously if a family is extremely poor with comparatively less resources then consequently, each member, be it a child or an adult will be required to work and bring in money in order to survive. The economic and family status in the rural areas of Pakistan is quite low and as a result children are forced to work in various manufacturing and tertiary industries and are also over-exploited. 61.2 % of Pakistan is illiterate and poor education resulting in limited exposure to human rights is a major cause of child labour.

Education is a sociological variable and is of extreme importance because it set free a person from the grip of ignorance. However most people in the rural areas have no access to educational institutions and thus a child learns the tricks of trade from his father and instead of gaining education he chooses to work as a labourer or is at times forced by parents due to their own lack of basic knowledge.

Pakistan does not have sound educational system under which a child can be adequately socialised into becoming a productive member of society. Education is not treated as a priority and inevitably child exploitation continues within our nation. Girls and boys are forced to work as domestic servants in the homes of the upper middle class or the richer elite. Thus class divisions become more prominent with the exploitation of the poor by the rich and this leads to an inequitable distribution of wealth and income.

Pakistan is going through a serious social stratification problem and the rich continues to get richer whereas the poor continues to get poorer. Girls are exploited within the rich households, are paid less and are often physically harassed by the male owners. This leads to further sex and gender-related issues and thus child labour needs to be strongly curtailed.

Pakistan needs a strong government and political structure to address the issue of child labour. However PPP government which considers the nuclear programme a priority but banning child labour is not a serious issue for them. There are loopholes in the political structure of Pakistan and a weak government is the main cause of the denial of rights of the citizens of a country. Therefore children’s rights are largely ignored and deliberately avoided.

For a positive change a democracy is needed which will fight against child labour through reformative action and laws and regulations. In Pakistan 7% of children working suffer from health problems and are physically abused as well by their employers. These are all structural problems within the social agencies of Pakistan which not only accelerate the rate of child labour but also set a precedent for other developing nations to follow.

Child labour is a complex problem which demands a range of solutions. There is no better way to prevent child labour than to make education compulsory. The West understood this a long time ago. Laws were enacted very early to secure continued education for working children; and now they have gone a step forward, and required completion of at least the preliminary education of the child before he or she starts work.

Martin Luther as back far 1524 sent a letter to German municipalities insisting it was their duty to provide schools, and the duty of parents to educate their children. In Sweden, a royal decree in 1723 instructed parents and guardians to diligently see to it that their children applied themselves to book reading. In Europe, one country after another; Scotland, Prussia (1817), Austria (1869), France, United Kingdom (1880) and Italy made compulsory of education. In 1872, Japan became the first non-Western country to make elementary school education compulsory with the declaration by the Meiji government.

The present government in Pakistan has made elementary education compulsory. Along with this, the government has distributed free books in primary schools so that parents, who cannot afford their children’s school expenses, send their children to schools. The major point is that this decision must be acted upon at all levels. There is strict need to stop child labour in this country. Awareness must be raised and the attention of parents ought to be diverted to the education of their children. Child labour laws should be put into practice strictly. In addition, the educational system of the country-must be reshaped and restructured according to national development goals. The orphans and other deserving children must be helped financially on a prolonged basis.

It is also essential to eliminate child labour from the country, that the political, economic and social system of the country are needed to be reshaped and such steps taken that make child labour in this country a crime. They should bring on the well-being of a lay man, good governance and end to exploitative thinking. If we succeed to act upon these principles, our country can easily get rid of this problem i.e. child labour.

The agreement that has recently been approved by Pakistan, Norway and ILO to eradicate child labour must be given importance and we hope that our rulers will put this agreement into practice using all means at their disposal.