KOHIMA — In
Nagaland, traditional factory child labour might not be common due to a lack of
large industries, but a different, more insidious form of child exploitation
has emerged: the commercialisation of children as domestic helpers under the
guise of providing education.
“We are employing a child as a domestic helper on the
pretext of education,” the administrator of Child Helpline-Women and Child
Development Control Room Nagaland, Neingutuonuo Kulnu, shared with Eastern
Mirror on the eve of World Day against Child Labour.
At Child Helpline 1098 in Nagaland, out of the 1398 cases
intervened since September 1, 2023, most of them have had to do with lost and
found and missing children. The second is of abused children, including rape,
sexual abuse, and physical abuse.
In the past, taking in a child as a domestic helper was a
“good deed” providing care and meeting the needs of the child, but of late, “it
has become a business”, she noted.
Citing a recent ‘background check’, Kulnu flagged an
overwhelming number of instances of emotional abuse issues originating from
domestic-helper situations.
While she expressed belief that everybody has been doing
their part to prevent the issue of domestic helpers, Kulnu asserted that calls
for a deeper understanding of the situation.
She pointed out that employing children below 14 years is
prohibited by law. One deeply disturbing case involved a nine-year-old boy who
died by suicide while staying with a guardian in Kohima.
Though he had been sent there for schooling, it emerged that
he was the only son in his family and had attended school for only a few
months. Despite receiving basic necessities like food and clothing, he lacked
emotional support—a factor Kulnu identified as critical.
“The child doesn’t know how to articulate emotional needs or
cope in such situations,” she said, underlining the need to view the issue
beyond material provisions.
Many children flee these arrangements and are later found
under "lost and found" cases. They often try to return to their homes
after being overwhelmed by discomforts like unfamiliar food, language, and
environment.
Adding to the complexity is the lack of awareness among
parents. Families from rural areas are often drawn by idealised visions of
cities like Kohima and Dimapur, believing their children will receive better
opportunities. However, this often turns into a form of economic exploitation,
with guardians paying monthly amounts to the child’s family while benefiting
from unpaid labour.
Aside from domestic help, children in Nagaland are also
found working in brick kilns, farms, hotels, auto workshops, shops, stone
quarries, and rat-hole coal mines.
Per the 2011 Census, 11,062 children between the ages of
five and 14 were engaged in labour in Nagaland. A survey conducted in Dimapur
reported 264 domestic child workers in a single colony.
To address this issue, the Nagaland Legislative Assembly
recently adopted the Nagaland Child and Adolescent Labour (Prohibition and
Regulation) Rules, 2024.
Globally, UNICEF reports that 160 million children were
subjected to child labour as of early 2020, nearly half of whom are involved in
hazardous work that threatens their health and development.
As Kulnu aptly put it, “When we talk about children, we are
talking about building the future. We must understand that emotional needs are
at risk, and that’s where we need to intervene.”
Education as a pretext: Hidden faces of child labour in Naga
