Friday 18 July 2014

A Stronger Bill is the Need of the Hour!

When people from different walks of life and different perspectives but, with a similar goal meet and share their ideas and brainstorm,we end up getting great solutions even to the most difficult problems.And,this is what happened at the National Consultation organized by CRY(Child Rights and You) on the topic Way Forward-Child Labour(Prohibition and Regulation)Act(Amendment)Bill, 2012 on 10th June,2014. From passionate Cry volunteers, some another NGO executives to representatives from ILO and UNICEF,almost everybody were present there.

Do you know that every sixth child in the world lives in India(MoSPI,2012)? And,with the country's population in billions, you can't even imagine the number of child labourers here.The figures are pathetic.The consultation was focused around the updations required in the CLPRA Act and concentrated on how the word 'regulation' needs to be removed from the Act. The major topics of discussion were :

  • Prohibition of children involved in labour should be extended upto 18 years
  • Steps required to debar children from family-extended labour.
  • Refining the definition of hazardous and non-hazardous activities in the context of Child Rights and Protection.
  • Consistency among the CLPRA Act and other acts like RTE,Juvenile Justice Act ,UNCRC Act and others.
  • Provisions required for rehabilitation and its implementation and many others.
The event began by a presentation on CLPRA Amendment Bill,2012 followed by presentations given by Ms. Shireen Khan,ILO and Ms. Vandana Khandari, UNICEF. It even included the experiences regarding field work shared by Ms.Mamta Borgoyary,CEO(FXB India Suraksha) and Vikas Sawant from CARE and some volunteers from CRY's branches at Mumbai and other locations.

One of the session was regarding Role of Youth in eliminating Child labour which was addressed by delhi volunteers Divyanshu,Latika and Nidhi.They talked  about the role that volunteers play in this initiative. Anshul Tiwari (Founder,Youth ki Awaaz) and Vicky Roy (RANG) were even there to share their opinions about the same.

The event ended on a high note.I got acquainted with a lot of people who are passionate volunteers and acquired a knowledge of various policies which seem to be more in favour than in against of child labour.With this, I would like to end this with a thought that i read somewhere that "Time is money in this world and it takes a lot to volunteer to do things.But, there is nothing stronger than the heart of a volunteer".

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