EXPERTS AT an UGC-sponsored seminar on child labour said socio-economic factors were responsible for rise in child labour in the country. Since child labour was a complex issue, the authorities should keep those factors in mind to chart out an effective strategy to root out this problem, they said.
They also laid stress on the need for educating the children to prevent them from working at a tender age. They said, “Education first and work later.” The participants said education scheme for child labour should be supplemented with poverty elevation scheme for their family.
The department of Economics and Sociology of Hamidia Girls Degree College organised the technical session of the seminar chaired by Prof Kalpagum, of the GB Pant Social Science Institute, Jhunsi and Prof KN Bhatt of the same Institute.
Prof AK Tomar from the Economics department, DS College, Aligarh Muslim University Aligarh chaired the second session on ‘Magnitude of the Problem and Socio-economic Causes and Effects. The third session on ‘Importance of Education and Child Labour was chaired by Dr AK Jha, reader sociology of KN Government College, Gyanpur.
Prof Ashim Mukherji of the Faculty of Commerce, Monirba, AU chaired the fourth session on child labour and health hazards. Academicians who came from the different parts of the country, including Mumbai, presented their papers on the issue. The scholars said child labour working in hazardous sectors were more in number than their male counterparts.
{{/usCountry}}Prof Ashim Mukherji of the Faculty of Commerce, Monirba, AU chaired the fourth session on child labour and health hazards. Academicians who came from the different parts of the country, including Mumbai, presented their papers on the issue. The scholars said child labour working in hazardous sectors were more in number than their male counterparts.
{{/usCountry}}Prof Mukherji said the child labour problem could not be solved by making laws and call to impart vocational training to a child worker.
He said population explosion was the main reason for families forcing their children to work. He said there was a need for social philosophy to bring about radical change in the lives of child workers.