2.1 CHILD LABOUR
1) CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS: Article 24 – No child below 14 years to be employed to work in any factory, mine or any hazardous employment.
2) FACTS:
(a) Globally, 1 in 10 children worldwide engaged in child labour.
(b) In India, As per Census 2011, the number of child labourers is around 10 million, of which 5.5 million are boys and 4.5 million are girls.
(c) Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, and Madhya Pradesh constitute nearly 55% of total working children in India.
(d) The prevalence of child labour in rural areas is close to 3 times higher than in urban areas.
The agriculture sector accounts for more child labourers, followed by services and industry.
(e) 72% of all child labour occur within families.
(f) An RTI report found that 95% of the amount in the child labour rehabilitation welfare fund over the last 10 years is lying unutilised.
3) GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES:
a) Committee: Gurupadswamy Committee, 1979: It was formed to study the issue of child labour and recommended a multipronged approach in dealing with the problems of working children.
b) International convention: India ratified ILO Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labour and Convention 138 on the Minimum Age of Employment.
c) Legislations:
i) Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Act 2016.
ii) National child labour project – 1988 – A central sector scheme to rehabilitate child
labour.
iii) PENCIL Portal – A separate online portal Platform for Effective Enforcement for No Child Labour (PENCIL) to ensure effective enforcement of provisions of Child Labour Act and smooth implementation of National Child Labour Project (NCLP) Scheme.
2.2 CHILD HEALTH AND NUTRITION
1) NFHS-5 FINDINGS:
a) Stunting: 38.4% of children under the age of five years i.e. One in every 3 children is stunted India has the second highest number of stunted children in South Asia (at 38%).
b) Malnourishment: One in every 3 children is malnourished.
c) Wasting: 17% of children under the age of five years.
d) Underweight: 19.7% under the age of five years.
e) Overweight: 4% of children under the age of five years.
f) Exclusive breastfeeding among infants 0-5 months of age: 58%
2) INITIATIVES:
a) PM POSHAN ABHIYAN- In September 2021, the Mid-Day Meal Scheme was renamed ‘PM POSHAN’.It has been launched for 5 years, from 2021-22 to 2025-26, aims at benefitting 12 crore children studying in 11 lakh schools.
b) Anemia Mukt Bharat strategy.
c) Integrated child development scheme(ICDS)
3) BEST PRACTICES AT STATE LEVEL: Andhra Pradesh: 82% of children are beneficiaries of MDM. It provides eggs/bananas to children twice a week using the state’s own resources.
4) Report findings about under-utilization of funds- The 2020 Comptroller and Auditor General of India audit of ICDS revealed that out of Rs 1,042 crore allocated, only Rs 908 crore was actually disbursed to state governments. Of the approximately Rs 4,300 crore released under POSHAN Abhiyaan from March 2018 to December 2019, only around 1,570 crore had been spent.
2.3 CHILD MARRIAGE
1) FACTS:
a) United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimates suggest that each year, at least 1.5 million girls under 18 get married in India, which makes it home to the largest number of child brides
in the world - accounting for a third of the global total.
b) Nearly 16% of the adolescent girls aged 15-59 are currently married.
c) Report published in December 2020 by ChildLine India, the pandemic and the subsequent lockdown have proved to be new drivers of child marriages in rural Madhya Pradesh.
d) Recent study by The Lancet shows that up to 2.5 million more girls (below the age of 18) around the world are at risk of marriage in the next 5 years because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
2) INITIATIVES:
a) LEGISLATIONS:
i) The Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929 restricts the practice of child marriage.
ii) The Special Marriage Act, 1954 and the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006 prescribe 18 and 21 years as the minimum age of consent for marriage for women and men respectively.
b) SUPREME COURT JUDGEMENT: The Supreme Court in “Seema vs. Ashwini Kumar, 2006” had directed that registration of all types of marriages should be made mandatory.
c) STATE INITIATIVE: Increasing girl’s access to schooling and higher education: Kanyashree Prakalpa scheme of the West Bengal government, a Conditional Cash Transfer scheme, aims to promote secondary education among females and to stop marriage of girls before the official age of 18.
d) COMMITTEE: The Union Ministry for Women and Child Development has set up a committee to examine matters pertaining to age of motherhood, imperatives of lowering Maternal Mortality Ratio and the improvement of nutritional levels among women. The Committee is headed by Jaya Jaitely.
e) INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION: Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, 1979: It states that “the betrothal and the marriage of a child shall have no legal effect.
3) SDG 5: Prevention of Child Marriage is a part of SDG 5 which deals with gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls.
2.4 CHILD ADOPTION:
1) FACTS:
a) 3 year old ‘Sherin Mathews’, an adopted Indian-American child, was found dead in mysterious circumstances in Dallas, USA.
b) Number of Indian adults registered with CARA has increased yet the number of adoptions has steadily reduced.
c) While 5,693 children were adopted within India in 2010, the 2016-17 figures were only 3,210.
d) NCPCR report in 2019 found that 1.5% of child care institutions (CCIs) do not conform to rules and regulations of the Juvenile justice act. Only 32% of total CCIs across the country were registered.
2) LEGISLATIONS FOR THE PROTECTION OF CHILDREN:
a) Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 (JJ Act): It governs the whole adoption procedure in the country.
b) Adoption Regulations 2017: The regulation addresses the need for in-family adoptions, post- adoption support, child-centric provisions, time-limit on courts for disposing of adoption deeds, etc.
c) JUVENILE JUSTICE (CARE AND PROTECTION OF CHILDREN) AMENDMENT ACT,2021:
i) It fulfils India's commitment as a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-
operation in respect of Inter-country Adoption (1993).
ii) The recent amendment was based on a report filed by the NCPCR in 2018-19 in which the over 7,000 Child Care Institutions (or children’s homes) were surveyed and several inadequacies prevailing in the system were highlighted.
d) The Juvenile Justice Rules of 2016 and the Adoption Regulations of 2017 followed to create the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA).
CARA is a statutory body for the regulation, monitoring and control of all intra-country and inter-country adoptions.
2.5 CHILD ABUSE
1) FACTS:
a) Every 1 in 2 children is prone to abuse.
b) In 95% of all cases registered, the abuser is known to the victim.
c) According to the NCRB 2014 report, 40% of rape victims are girls under the age of 18.
d) A report titled the Global Threat Assessment Report 2021, released by WeProtect Global Alliance has revealed that Covid-19 had contributed to a significant spike in child sexual exploitation and abuse online.
e) In the past two years, the reporting of child sexual exploitation and online abuse has reached its highest level.
2) INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION: The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989 (ratified by India in 1992) requires sexual exploitation and sexual abuse to be addressed as heinous crimes.
3) LEGISLATIONS:
a) POCSO – POCSO Act defines any child below 18 years of age.
i) Low Conviction Rate: The rate of conviction under the POCSO act is only about 32% if one takes the average of the past 5 years and the percentage of cases pending is 90%.
Conviction rate in POCSO cases was a meagre 28.2% in 2016.
ii) Pendency: Also, 89% of the cases of child sexual abuse were awaiting justice in 2020.
iii) Bails: Higher numbers of bails are granted for crimes committed under POCSO vis-à-vis other crimes.
iv) Judicial Delay: The Kathua Rape case took 16 months for the main accused to be convicted whereas the POCSO Act clearly mentions that the entire trial and conviction process has to be done in one year.
v) ON INEFFECTIVENESS OF LAWS: The laws are in place and they have been made more serious and severe as well, but awareness about, both the gravity of the situation and the severity of the law, needs to be increased, may be through a public movement.
Accountability of the implementing agencies needs to be ensured as well.
4) INITIATIVES FOR PREVENTING CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE:
a) Child Abuse Prevention and Investigation Unit
b) Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao
c) Juvenile Justice Act/Care and Protection Act, 2000
d) Child Marriage Prohibition Act (2006)
e) Child Labour Prohibition and Regulation Act, 2016
f) Operation Smile.
g) POCSO e Box for children (to report child abuse) by NCPCR.
3. ELDERLY
1) FACTS:
a) The elderly fertility forms approx. 13% of population in 2021, expected to rise to 13% of population by 2031.
b) Longitudinal Ageing Study of India (LASI) 2020 report-
i) 75% of the elderly population of India suffers from one or more chronic diseases.
ii) 8% of the adults older than 45 years of age reported severe constraint in household food availability.
c) According to NSS 75th round on Education in India, only 5.3% of males and only 1.7% of females of 60 years and above can operate a computer. The gap is higher in rural areas.
d) The Antara State of Seniors Survey 2020 revealed low insurance penetration among seniors.
e) Our pension system currently ranks 32 out of the 37 countries covered in the Global Pension System Ranking. Only 28% of the people over 65 age receiving pension
f) Antara’s State of Seniors Survey 2020, over 60 per cent of seniors said they wanted to work beyond retirement age. This highlights the need for raising the retirement age in India.
g) Silver Economy: It is the system of production, distribution and consumption of goods and services aimed at using the purchasing potential of older and ageing people and satisfying their consumption, living and health needs.
h) Feminisation of ageing: United Nations Population Fund report highlighted-
i) The sex ratio of the elderly has increased from 938 women to 1,000 men in 1971 to 1,033 in 2011 and is projected to increase to 1,060 by 2026.
ii) The report also noted that between 2000 and 2050, the population of 80-plus people would have grown 700% “with a predominance of widowed and highly dependent very old women” and so the special needs of such old women would need significant focus.
2) INITIATIVES:
a) INTERNATIONAL INITIATIVE: Decade of Healthy Ageing (2020-2030) is endorsed by World Health Assembly in August 2020. WHO defines healthy ageing as “the process of developing and maintaining the functional ability that enables wellbeing in older age.”
b) GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES:
i) National Policy on Older Persons (NPOP), 1999.
ii) Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007
iii) Senior Citizens Welfare Fund
iv) Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PM-JAY)
v) Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension Scheme (IGNOAPS): Being implemented by the Ministry of Rural Development since 2007.
c) NGO- Apna Ghar, Helpage India, Asha Kiran, Agewell foundation.
3) SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOAL 3 gives attention to well-being for all at all ages.
