Children - Terre des Hommes

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attention on child labour issues, there are serious difficulties
on the ground to trace the routes or to trace the linkages
between mines that use child labour and the companies that
buy the products.
Similar case of state and industry irresponsibility were seen
even where a precious stone like diamond is concerned.
Children are working in Madhya Pradesh to find diamonds
for local contractors. The Obulapuram mines and the
child labour in Bellary is another clear example. The local
contractors who hire child labour do not even make a
pretension of hiding the facts. In Bellary they stated that
they are immune from laws and regulations, which they
flout openly because ‘it is taken care of ” by the Obulapuram
Mines. This reflects the arrogant defiance to law as lawkeepers
up to the highest levels of power can be easily
purchased as stated by them.
In most of the EIA documents we reviewed, social impacts
and rehabilitation promises of mining companies vaguely
refer to indirect benefits to local communities and children as
it is assumed that the local economy grows, thereby leading
to local market forces entering with private educational
institutions, hospitals, employment opportunities and
consumerism. In reality what we saw was that these are not
opportunities accessed by affected dalit and adivasi children
but more so by children of the middle class and white-collar
employees of the companies. More often, the fact is that
the local children end up as child labour in the tea stalls,
mechanic shops, hotels and other economic ‘opportunities’
and ‘benefits’ generated by mining companies.
Also, in every case study where large-scale mining projects
were set up, the people stated that they were promised jobs
and employment before the mining activities started, but
later, hardly any persons from affected communities ever got
jobs. Most of the case studies were also done in mine sites of
public sector companies who are meant to be more socially
responsible. It is over 30 years since the NALCO bauxite
project was begun. In these 30 years the data from the case
study reveals that there has been little upward mobility for
the children of the affected families, either educationally or
economically. This is the fate of those affected by a public
sector project where social responsibility is intended to be
the principal agenda. There does not appear to be a single
mining project that has fulfilled the rehabilitation promises
in a manner that has improved the life of the affected
communities or that could set a precedent for a best practice
that the government can set as a pre-condition to private
mining companies. More so, there has been no assessment
or stock taking of the status of rehabilitation especially with
regard to the status of children. With India’s thrust for the
future being privatisation of mining projects, for sustainable
mining to be implemented with seriousness, best practices
have to be more forthcoming from the public sector and the
looming gaps that exist in the law and regulatory mechanisms
have to be plugged.
Yet, the new projects proposed in Kasipur and Lanjigarh by
private and global mining companies like Vedanta/Sterlite,
whose human rights records in earlier projects across
the world, do not set a precedent for socially responsible
mining, justify the suspicion and strong opposition from
communities and the civil society. The corporate induced
conflicts and state of terror in these regions, particularly in
Orissa, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand were visible all through
the study where data collection was interrupted several times
due to strikes, bandhs, non cooperation of local communities
due to fear of police and industry repercussions, and the
inability to travel without fear of violence. It is of greater
concern that the adivasi children are being thrown out of the
Scheduled Areas (as seen from the migration in Damanjodi,
Panna and other tribal areas after mining activities began)
and these areas are being thrown open to multinationals,
against the laws of the Fifth Schedule of the Constitution
and the verdict given in the Samatha Judgement. Hence, the
adivasi children of today stand to lose their Scheduled Area
ownership and protection as their lands are allowed to slip
into the hands of the private mining industries. This is the
most brutal state injustice to adivasi children.
These case studies are not stories but the real life facts of
not scattered or obscure numbers- these are a few million
mining children in India. And we are no closer to our
MDGs that we have set for our country to fulfil the needs
of our children, than when we started. This is because our
development policies work inversely to our goals, and as
the state overviews presented along with the case studies
demonstrates, growth indicators for the marginalised
children are shockingly low, in each of the mining affected
districts. This inverse-ness of the development trajectory
contributed significantly by mining, is only making the
situation worse for children in the mining regions and for
the government to meet its targets.
Therefore, a lot depends on the political will, public
accountability and bureaucratic transparency. A lot also
depends on a nation’s conscience. We hope that the case