The Impact of Child Labour on the Rights of Children in India – An Analysis

Child Labour is a menace that has plagued the Indian society for long. According to the report of International Labour Organisation (ILO), around the 12.9 million children in India are engaged in labour and are employed in hazardous industries. Inspite of having numerous legislations and constitutional provisions ridiculing and prohibiting child labour, there seems to exist a continued practice of employing young children to work in areas which have proved to be detrimental to their mental, physical and emotional well being. Discrepancy in the estimation of children who are part of the workforce, concealment of facts by parents, improper implementation of the legislative enactments, etc have aggravated the issue further. The research aims at addressing this element of concern, sorting out the scope of the legislations prohibiting child labour in India, pointing out the probable causes behind this growing peril, analysing the consequences it had on the children and also exploring the measures that could be taken in order to keep child labour in check.