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

8 Introduction
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someone who has had no education and whose health may have been damaged by early entrance
into the workforce. Child labour is not simply a consequence of poverty, but one of its causes
and its removal (which means that children are in school) is likely to increase the well-being of
the poor’ 18 . No country has successfully ended child labour without first making education
compulsory 19 . As long as school is not compulsory children will enter the labour force. If primary
education were made compulsory in India, it would be easier to monitor school attendance than to
monitor children in the workplace, and easier to force parents to send their children to school than
to force employers not to hire children. The new United Front Government, which is ruling since
June 1996, has made a declaration, that 'the right to free and compulsory education shall be made
a fundamental right and enforced through suitable statutory provisions' 20 .
In a book on economics of labour and industrial relations, the objective of the development of an
economy is stated as follows:
'The objective of the development of an economy is to raise its people's standard
of living. Keeping this in view, labour problems in a developing economy deserve
special study and attention. The labour force as a whole is the abundant resource
available in the economy and therefore its sustained and stable growth depends in
a very large measure upon the proper utilisation of this resource. Problems of
industrial labour (in the formal and informal sectors of the economy) deserve a
special study because this section of the labour force is directly faced with the problems
and consequences of the development of the country's economy. The rate of
growth and the nature of industrial civilization in the country depends on the
extent to which their problems are solved successfully' 21 .
Concluding from the above, child labour and exploitation of workers in the informal and formal
sector do not fit in any developing nor developed economy, including India. Children who work
full-time and who are deprived of elementary education, health care and play, will in the long run
affect the economy adversely. Because they are children, they are easier to exploit, to intimidate
and to dictate, whether they are working in the formal or informal sector of the economy. The
employer is abusing his power in the unequal employer-(child) worker relation. Child labour,
therefore, needs to be eradicated and working conditions and standards of adult labourers should
be improved. Poverty alleviation and employment generation do not only depend on high growth
rates but also on policies designed to achieve distributive justice for the lowest strata of the Indian
society.
18 Myron Weiner, 'Child labour in Developing Countries: The Indian Case'. In: New Wave, March 27, 1994, p.9. Emphasis is added
by the author of this report.
19 'Among the twenty-three largest developing countries (those with populations of over 25 million) India ranks eighteenth in overall
literacy rate, ahead only of Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Sudan, and tied with Egypt, but well behind Zaire, China, Indonesia, the
Philippines, Thailand, Turkey, Vietnam, Mexico, Brazil, Korea, and Colombia. For example, Sri Lanka massively expanded its primary
school enrolments in the 1950s. By 1981, 90 per cent of the primary school age children were in school and 70 per cent of all children
completed five years of schooling. The story is similar for most of the countries of Southeast Asia, where illiteracy has sharply declined
largely as a result of heavy state investment in primary schools and compulsory education policies'. Quotation is made by Myron Weiner,
'Child Labour in developing Countries: The Indian Case'. In: New Wave, March 27, 1994.
20 Source: Frontline, June 28, 1996, p.24. 'A good beginning'.
21 T.N.Bhagoliwal. Economics of Labour and Industrial Relations, 1995, p. 11-12. Published by Sahitya Bhawan: Agra, India.
Parenthesis added by the author of this report.