THE ONLY way to get away from child labour is to eliminate poverty from such countries. Child labour is almost reduced in western countries by combining legislation and its enforcement with compulsory primary education, but this is not so in a number of developing and least developed countries. It exists even in industrialized democracies, especially in Eastern Europe.

A UNICEF report says that children are employed in farms, factories and the streets of the world because an employer or a parent benefits. In quite a number of rich and middle income Indian families, domestic help is quite often obtained through small children. This is really unfortunate. Truly speaking, the child labour scenario across many such countries continues to be bleak today as it has been for decades despite vote catching rhetoric of the ruling politicians. Apart from their employers, the working children from poor families are even sexually and emotionally abused by their close relatives.

Children out of school are both the cost and cause of child labour. I think that the whole world has to get together to reduce/eliminate child labour.