speaking of free trade, Child Labor Persists in India Despite New Laws

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At the bottom of the heap are boys like a rag-picker, who earns money by rummaging through garbage heaps. There are no laws keeping children from picking trash. He claims to earn an average of $15 a week by picking through trash 12 hours a day. He has seven siblings, three of them in school. His father works in a park and his mother at a flour mill.

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Find political will to end ‘disgrace’ of child labor, Indian bishops urge

In a June 12 message, ”Protect children and serve the nation” issued on the day of the observance of No Child Labor Day, Bishop Joshua Mar Ignathios of Mavelikara, chairman of Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India Commission for Labor, called child labor “one of the oldest evils” and a “disgrace” that reduces underage workers to the status of “things” rather than human beings.

“Child labor exists because it is very profitable and convenient for the beneficiaries who are included the elite in the society as also high ranking lawmen,” the bishop said, noting that, while the issue has been studied and discussed for years, “it not only remains unchanged but is spreading rapidly by way of child trafficking.”