By: Mousumi Kumar
“Child labor and poverty are inevitably bound together and if you continue to use the labor of children as the treatment for the social disease of poverty, you will have both poverty and child labor to the end of time.”- Grace Abbott
Poverty is the most important cause of child labour. Due to poverty, the poor children are not able to go to school and they work as unskilled workers. Children are the future citizens of our nation, and their development is the utmost priority of the country. In today’s world, child labour is increasing rapidly and it destroys a child’s mental and physical condition. Child labour is like a disease for our society and it destroys the future of our next generation. The 2001 national census of India estimated the total number of child labour aged 5-14, to be at 12.6 million. Small scale and community-based studies have found estimated prevalence in hazardous occupations. Children less than 14 years old works in agriculture, factories, mining, and as street vendors. Child labour is a global phenomenon. It exists both in the developing and the developed countries though with a difference in cause and magnitude. Its prevalence is more in developing countries as compared to the development ones because the children from poor families were expected to participate to the family income and sometimes they work in a dangerous condition of 12-hour shifts. According to 2017 statistics, India is one of the leading countries in Asia with a whopping 33 million children employed in various forms of child labour. Analysis of census data by Child Rights and You (CRY) revealed that about 1.4 million child labourers in India in the age group of 7-14 years can’t write their names. This means one in three child labourers in the said age group are illiterate. This is the grim reality of children who work for more than six months in a year.
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Even after the employment of children has been banned in the industrial and the commercial sectors but a UNICEF report estimates that 246 million children are still engaged in child labour in developing countries including India.
The media is playing a very important role in society. The media has been constantly used as an efficient means of spreading awareness amongst the masses. Media has the power to reach almost everyone. Most of the government and private organisations use the media to spread awareness as it can be broadcasted in different languages which makes them understand better. Cinema or film a form of mass media which has become a powerful tool since the day it was been introduced to the world. The film industry is one of the most expensive and discovering industries in mass media. Some Indian movies have attempted to raise their voice against child labour for many years now. Cinemas have been used to create awareness by using the method of role-play so that people can empathize with the children working under such conditions. They feel that they are actually there with the person. Various movies, short films and documentaries have been released in India and abroad highlighting the daily life of working child labour in an inhuman environment and industrial conditions. Some of these Bollywood movies like “Boot Polish”(1954), It is one of the first movies which deals with child labour and it was directed by Prakash Arora and produced by Raj Kapoor. It won the best film at the Filmfare Award. The movie shows how two kids, after the death of their mother, are forced into begging by their aunt. Later, with the help of bootlegger, they buy a shoe polish kit and begin to shine shoes, thus working instead of begging for a living. Apart from this, “Slumdog Millionaire” (2008) movie is also based on child labour. It was an Oscar-Winning movie that gained worldwide popularity because of its rags to riches story that revolves around the life of an orphaned slum dweller who wins a famous competition by using the knowledge he gained from his life experiences. It shows that everyone has the capability to do something big, but they need an opportunity. “I am Kalam”(2010) is also based on child labour. The movie was screened at Cannes Film Festival. A 12 years boy plays a tea vendor and server at a roadside dhaba, but dreams to make it big in life. The movie effectively portrays how kids from any background are capable of fulfilling their dreams. In 2011, the Indian film industry released another film on child labour, “Stanley ka Dabba” that depicts the story of a fourth-grader, who cleans tables at a restaurant and earns money to stay in school. Often abused by his employer at work, at school, Stanley is bullied by his teachers who constantly demands food from the students.
“The Price of Free” (2018) is a documentary about Novel Prize winner Kailash Satyartha. The film depicts how Satyarthi left a career as an electrical engineer and started Bachpan Bachao Andolan to rescue the children from slavery. In the decade since, he has rescued more than 87000 children and built a global movement including one largest civil society movements, the Global March against Child labour. This documentary is about the children who are forced into slave labour due to rising global demands for cheap goods. There are also various Indian short films based on child labour like Traffic Signal (2017) is a short film based on a poem by Muskan Asthana, this film shows the struggles that the underprivileged section of society encounters every day, and highlights the issue of child labour in the society. This film shows the drawbacks of our society regarding the education of underprivileged children, how the kids are ended being a victim of it and starts working at a very tender age, to make a living.
Child labour is the main problem in our society and films are playing a major role in India and abroad to stop child labour. Cinemas are the most powerful art form in the present world and it can help us to better understand our own lives, the lives of those around us and even how our society and culture operate. The film industry has the power to reach the people and even change the perception of the people. These movies have definitely spread awareness among the masses. Such films should remain in the future; it would help to prevent child labour from our country.
(The writer is a student of Centre for Studies in Journalism and Mass Communication, Dibrugarh University)
