Child-and-adult-labour-in-the-export-oriented-garment-and-gem-polishing-industry-of-India

Child and adult labour in the gem polishing export industry of Jaipur
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not have reserves of money and could not easily find a job which was not related to the gem industry.
These workers had not been registered as such and could not rely on compensations for
the days they were not employed or ill.
(ii) Upward mobility: rise in job level
Some workers, whether illiterate or educated, had become unit-owners. The illiterate unit-owners
were in the minority. The majority of these workers, who were often illiterate, stayed artisans and
remained dependent on (sharing of) wages for the rest of their lives. Lack of education seemed to
be the limiting factor why the majority of the workers could not make an upward move in the industry
but kept on being casual workers.
For the majority of the unit-owners it seemed to be very difficult to become traders or exporters.
Upward mobility did go to a certain limit. The structure of the industry and the special knowledge
about the terms and tricks of the trade which was required, seemed to be the limiting factors for
the majority of the unit-owners to become big exporters, traders or middlemen.
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6.5.3 Child labour in the gem polishing industry: tradition or exploitation;
work or labour?
The question is if the phenomenon of child labour in the gem polishing industry today, is still a
tradition or that the tradition has changed into increased economic exploitation under the disguise
of apprenticeship. The actual question here concerns the distinction between 'work' and 'labour'.
The International Labour Organization states that 'when work is a part of the socialization process
and a means of transmitting skills from parent to child, one can hardly speak of child labour'.
'Child labour', refers to situations 'where children are compelled to work on a regular or continuous
basis to earn a living for themselves or for their families, and as a result, are deprived of
educational and social development'.
The expansion of the industry had led to the formation of many new small units with one owner,
who had quick profits in mind. These owners or contractors, who were often not the father or
direct relatives of the children, employed children for 8 to 10 hours per day. They partly educated
the children in valuable skills and made use of their relatively poor situation and the attitude of
Muslim parents that a 'working child is better than a roaming child'. They employed children of
neighbours and/or relatives. The unit owners or employers paid the child 10% of the wage an
adult earned for doing the same job, after this the child had completed two years of training
without getting paid. And even that amount was not always paid after 1 or 2 years of training
because it was accepted that during the training the child earned nothing. The training period was
a disguised form of exploitation which was used by the employers to justify their omission to pay
the learning child for its work. The children were used as economic assets to give the employers a
better profit margin. The children in these relatively newer units were not taught valuable skills
which would give them any assurance of ways of upward mobility in higher-level jobs later in
their lives. Without education the chances of coming out of the vicious circle of exploitation
seemed even more difficult. On top of this, the wages of the child labourers had been increased
during the last 8 to 10 years which attracted children even more and gave an extra incentive to