Children - Terre des Hommes

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Quarry is a very big area spread over 10 km, and 26 workers’
communities are settled here. It was difficult to count the
number of children working, due to the presence of mine
owners. In Samarth Stone Quarry, it was reported that 30
children were not attending the Pashan Shala but going for
daily wage labour. In MT Patil Stone Quarry in Nashik, 20
children do not attend the Pashan Shala. In the nine stone
quarries we found that there were around 352 children who
would have all been child labour but for Santulan.
Problems in Attending School
Apart from the economic reason, children do not have
education facilities as the colonies of the mine workers are
far from the local village. So the school is too far from their
homes, for the children. Parents also expressed their fears
about the heavy traffic of tractors carrying loads and said
that it was not safe for children to walk on these roads. As
the parents leave for work in the early hours of the day and
only return late in the evening, the older children have the
responsibility of their siblings at the house as well as at the
mine site, to watch over them for any blasting or hazardous
activities in the surroundings. Besides, the children in the age
group of 10–13 have to do most of the household chores, and
they are always late for school or have to take their siblings
along with them. At noon time, many of the children have to
take food for their parents to the mine site.
Open cast stone quarries without any protection wall
(Photo September 2009)
Most of the children interviewed had terrifying stories to
narrate about their experiences working in the mines, about
the death or illness of their parents because of which they had
to accompany other adults for work and how the only relief
came in the form of the Pashan Shalas. For example, a 12 year
old girl from Gore Wati said,
“My father died of some illness and therefore I had
to go with my mother to the quarry.”
and broke down into tears when asked to talk about her work
there.
It was not possible to verify the education status of the
children in the study area from secondary reports because
none of the mine workers’ colonies figure in the Census or
school education records of the Ministry of Human Resource
Development. As the children do not go to the village or
panchayat schools, we have not included the school data
from these government schools. Hence our only means of
verification was the statements of the workers’ families and
interviews with children, which was extremely difficult, given
the intimidating atmosphere that the children were working.
Alternately, we went through the records of the Pashan Shalas
run by Santulan as these records give a picture of the mining
children who would have been out of school or be child
labourers if the Pashan shalas did not exist. Table 2.03 provides
information on some aspects of enrolment in Pashan Shalas.
Migration into the quarry regions in search of work is also a
serious concern and affects the education of children. Table
2.04 provides some information on migrant shildren.
Table 2.04 gives a highly underestimated picture of the migrant
children in each district in Maharashtra. The experience of
Santulan, as reflected in their Pashan Shala records, clearly
indicates that the situation is far worse than what is officially
projected. The Assistant Labour Commissioner of Pune
district admitted that it was only because of Santulan that
many of the mine workers’ children are attending school.
They do not have a single NCLP school in Pune. According
to him, they can only run an NCLP school if they have a
minimum of 50 children at any given place and since this was
difficult and as most children work in restaurants, mechanic
shops and other petty stores, the government is not running
NCLP schools. He informed that the government is taking
the initiative to rescue child workers by setting up a task-force
with the help of NGOs and child welfare committees, but
this was, however, not very evident in the mine sites visited
where there was no NGO intervention.
Wages
Mine labour is erratic and economically unviable, most times.
Each worker gets Rs. 25–30 for a tractor load of stone, and
seven to eight persons work together to fill one tractor. A