Children - Terre des Hommes

179
Summary and Recommendations
Almost every state and district in India has some kind of
mineral extracted or processed. However, it would have been
impossible for our team to cover the entire geographical
area of mining or range of minerals whose extraction has
serious impacts on the lives of children. Therefore, we
chose a few sites in eight states that show clear impacts on
children due to mining. These case studies could be, to a
large extent, representative of many of the mining situations
that children in India are suffering from. They provide a
glimpse into the real life situations of adivasi, rural, migrant
and other poor sections of child population in India that
are impacted directly and indirectly by mining. These sitespecific
stories provide information not only of mining but
also of the general development situation of children in
these regions.
In most of the secondary data compiled from the state
level child statistics, it shows that low child development
indicators are most often overlapping with mining affected
regions. This trend signifies the status and direction in
which children of marginalised sections in these states are
located today, which further substantiates the perspectives
being put forward by most civil society and human rights
groups—that mining has not contributed significantly to
the development of children but rather, it has largely created
negative impacts on children in these areas.
The primary data from the case studies reiterates this picture
and also reveal a very bitter truth—problems are glaring
but accountability is elusive. A large number of children
in India face marginalisation due to state irresponsibility
in delivering basic development services, and because of
which large sections of rural, dalit and adivasi children are
seriously suffering from malnutrition, illiteracy, starvation,
homelessness and several life threatening illnesses.
However, for mining affected children, this is being
exacerbated by a ruthlessly exploitative industry which is
pushing this neglect into a situation of desperation where
increase in poverty, landlessness, food insecurity are forcing
children into child labour in mining and other forms of
labour, exposing them to crime and violence, making them
vulnerable to trafficking, chronic ill-health, and inhuman
living conditions. Children of local communities, workers
(unorganised, contract), farmers around mine sites were
rarely found to benefit from mining in this study. The rapid
degeneration in general living conditions and governance
wherever mining projects came up has brought further
deterioration to existing institutions and development
structures like schools, anganwadis, PHCs or transport that
are intended to meet the basic needs of children. Therefore,
instead of improvement, the quality of life was seen to
have alarmingly reduced to a struggle for survival for many
children and their families.
Yet, the paradox of mining lies in the fact that the mining
industry or the mining administration is not legally
responsible for ensuring most of the rights and development
needs of children. India boasts of several legal protections
for children, with the Right to Education being the latest
fundamental right. These laws are strengthened by positive
schemes to bring children out of poverty and marginalisation,
very few of which provide any protection or relief to mining
affected children. Several other departments like the
Women and Child Welfare Department, the Education
Department, the Tribal Welfare Department, and Labour
Department, to mention a few have to address the problems
created by mining. This makes for an inter-departmental
conflict of interest and leaves ample room for ambiguities
in state accountability. In this process, the child is being
forgotten.