Strategy + Ventures: June 2006 Archives

I came across this often discussed and debated topic on the BBC website. Child labour - India's 'cheap commodity' The thing is politicians and the society at large need to make huge necessary investments to fix this situation. What's it all about? A lot of people who are poor, illiterate and from less developed areas in India tend to get their daughters married off as soon as they can. 18 is the legal age for a girl to get married, but some of them get married even earlier by fudging birth certificates. These girls (and their bridegrooms) are rarely ever taught anything about family planning, and end up having a few babies. The parents of these children find out that with their meagre resources, they cannot support so many mouths. So they send some of their children with "agents" who place these children in kitchens, factories, shops, homes - where they do menial and sometimes dangerous work. They work 12 hours a day, 6 - 7 days a week. They're fed and housed (not too well, but they don't have much choice) They get paid a meagre amount every month which - if all goes well - is sent by their "employer" to their parents, who use this money to survive and raise the other children. Why do Indians tolerate this? There is no social security net in India. The government has recently set up a program to pay out money in the poorest districts of India, but this has yet to be implemented. So what happens to folks with no money for food, water and shelter? Well, they do without it. Now think of those kids whose parent's cannot support them. There is a horrible choice to be made here:

1. Let them work, and earn the money to live
2. Don't let them work, and they die

I would choose to let them work, as would any rational person. Better that they work and have a chance to live, rather than starve to death. Can we solve this in some way? Kids should stop working all the time, and get a chance at an education. The government should set up such a program to foster this: Funding

1. Get the employer of the child garnishee a certain amount of money = say 100 rupees a month from the child and pay it into a fund set up by the government and administered on the district level. This amount should be capped at say 250 rupees per month.
2. The government matches this by 200% i.e. 200 rupees. Of this sum which 150 rupees goes towards subsidising the child's contribution completely. 25 rupees goes to the employer. And 25 rupees goes to the family of the child. If there is no family, this money goes to the fund. This means that the family and the employer get extra money from the government.
3. Along with this money comes an obligation. The employer needs to let the child attend school for a number of hours proportional to the amount garnisheed by the employer. So 100 rupees would mean 10 hours of education per month. 200 rupees would mean 20 hours of education per month and so on.
4. Private companies and individuals should be allowed to fund this program as well. Their contributions should be completely tax deductible.

Tutors

1. The tutors should be drawn from huge community of retired teachers and an older kids teach younger kids kind of scheme.
2. Their incentives will be money (any salary is welcome, as teachers are always paid less than they should be), recognition for above average performance of children and free travel for them anywhere in India on all surface transportation. They should also get access to internet based resources to help them teach better (- Thanks a billion Mr. Negroponte)
3. They should be judged on performance of their students as appraised by teachers in neighbouring villages/cities; preferably teachers who are unconnected with each other. They should also be appraised by the students themselves. Their appraisal should govern their pay.

Checks and Balances This is the toughest thing to manage.

1. A part of the incentives for all stakeholders should be the academic success of the children. A part of the checks should be on the manner in which the funds are allocated and spent.
2. Local NGOs and university students would be a great asset in this regard. They can monitor what's being spent and where, seek out and stamp out the corruption that they can find.
3. One incredibly important resource could be the children themselves. They must know how much they have been paying, and how much the others have been paying, and how the budget of their particular school is created and run. This might seem like a long shot, but these kids are among the bravest and most tenacious human beings I have ever seen in my life.