Who'll hold these little hands?

BANGALORE: India's IT capital may be known for all its glitz and glamour, but one scar on its image is child labour. From hotels to industries and as domestic workers — you can spot kids everywhere. While they bear the brunt of a cursed childhood, the state labour department seems to have done little to uplift their condition.
Digest this: the department has rescued and rehabilitated only nine child labourers in the last two years as per information received through RTI filed by Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL).
One practical hurdle in rescue and rehabilitation of such children is the confusion that prevails about their age. According to the Child Labour Act, it's 14 years; Juvenile Justice Act (18 years); Immortal Trafficking Act (12 years) and Mines Act (16 years). With each Act specifying different age limits, it's virtually impossible to implement the same.
Another vital loophole lies in the definition of child labour as per the Child Labour Act. The Act doesn't consider domestic child labourers' work as 'hazardous'.
"The Child Labour Act was formed in 1986. Despite conducting several studies and surveys, the Act hasn't been amended further. Domestic child labour isn't considered hazardous. Unfortunately, such children are equally exposed to hazardous environment and are victims of physical and mental abuse," said Nagasimha G Rao, convenor of CACL, Bangalore chapter.
In 2008, a joint commission was initiated by the state education and labour department to rescue, rehabilitate child labourers and prevent school dropouts. Surprisingly, till date, members of the joint commission haven't even had a single meeting.
Though the Juvenile Justice Act stresses on special juvenile police across police stations, this provision hasn't been effectively implemented in the state.
As per the Child Labour Act, working children below 14 years are considered child labourers. However, this excludes a large majority in the age bracket of 14 to 18 years. "Most children in this group are drug addicts, sexually exploited and come under runaway cases. We have been pushing the government to consider all out-of-school kids as child labourers and to make preschool-like anganwadis compulsory," he said.
According to child welfare commission member P N Basavaraj, 80 to 100 new children get admitted to the government child home for boys every month, and majority of them are labourers. "Most are from Bihar, Orissa and Rajasthan. The remaining fall under the category of trafficking and bonded labourers. Unfortunately, conviction rate of those exploiting children is nil in the state."