THE CONCERNED FOR WORKING CHILDREN (CWC) BELIEVES THAT THE PROBLEMS OF CHILDREN WHO WORK CAN BE SOLVED WITHIN THE PRESENT CONTEXT  

THE OBJECTIVE OF THE FOUNDING MEMBERS OF CWC WAS TO DEVELOP A PROGRAMME WHICH WOULD HAVE A SUSTAINABLE IMPACT ON THE ISSUE. 

• In order to achieve this, CWC works with local governments, community and working children themselves to implement viable, comprehensive, sustainable and appropriate solutions in partnership with all the major actors, so that children do not have to work. It empowers working children so that they may be their own first line of defence and participate in an informed manner in all decisions concerning themselves.
• CWC upholds the following concerns as central to any action aspiring to improve the quality of life of working children: 
  1. All actions should be child centered and in the best interest of working children. Interventions should have a positive short term and long-term effect, first and foremost on the children themselves.
  2. All interventions should improve the quality of life for children, their families and their communities. 
  3. The immediate and long-term impact of all actions on 'working children' have to be monitored and assessed. It should be mandatory that such mechanisms are set up before any intervention is implemented. 
  4. Organised representation of working children and their protagonism has to be recognised and respected. No decisions or actions which have an impact on working children should be taken without consulting them

• Solve child labour problem and be able to declare areas `child labour free' 
• Facilitate protagonism of working children so that they may enrich their lives and contribute towards building a more just and equitable society
• Create the `time' and space' for children to be empowered by making an impact on National and State policy, legislation and programmes. 
• Develop theoretical and practical models that effectively and efficiently deal with the problem and can be replicated both by the state and by NGOs.
• Influence state and National Governments and International agencies and organisations to focus on child labour as a major part of their political agenda. 
• Influence state and National Governments and International agencies and organisations to focus on child labour as a major part of their political agenda. 
• Participate and influence in National, Regional and International fora in order to bring the issue of child labour into the political spotlight. 
• Use all forms of media, including main stream, to sensitise the public to the issue and change perceptions in order to create a climate where child labour is not acceptable. 
• Build relations with NGOS, institutions, trade unions, social and political movements and individuals in order to build a strong lobby in support of the rights of children.
• Develop with others, an alternate agenda for India where there will be no exploitation of children. 

The Concerned for Working Children (CWC) have been working in the field of child labour since 1980. In its early years, CWC was involved in the unionisation of the informal sector where children below the age of 14 years comprised nearly 40 per cent of the total work force. These children, who in many ways were more militant than the adult members were deeply disappointed when they found that the agreements as a result of collective bargaining had not given them any benefits as laws did not recognise them. They wanted to change the law to one that recognised them as workers and protected them as children at the same time. The children and the members of the union embarked on an exercise to draft an alternative legislation for working children in 1985.  

The children approached the question from the premise that the reasons why they worked could not be changed and proceeded to address the work situation. The adult office bearers of the union approached the problem from a different angle as they were not willing to accept the causes of children's work as given. They wanted to find ways to tackle these by inducing structural changes. These two visions were integrated and a Draft Bill was developed.  

In 1985, the Central Labour Ministry agreed to convert the draft into an official Bill of the Ministry. In 1986 the official Bill was presented to the Central Cabinet for approval. A watered down version of this draft was presented to Parliament and passed in October 1986. Though the Legislation was fraught with loopholes and definition al difficulties, it did generate a major debate on child work in independent India for the first time. The children also proved that they could engage in policy debates and make major contributions in this area.  
 

CWC started its urban programme, Ankur in 1985. Ankur works in three major sectors and in urban centers. CWC's activists work towards the empowerment of working children, their families and communities in the urban areas.  

Gramashrama, CWC's Rural project was started in 1989 in order to address the issue of child labour comprehensively by stemming the trend of migration of rural children to urban centres in search of work. Gramashrama presently works in 80 villages located in four districts of Karnataka in order to evolve a child centered, comprehensive development for its villages in order to make villages child labour free.  

The scope of the two field programmes includes revival of rural economy, evolution of appropriate education systems, strengthening decentralised local governance and empowerment of working children and their communities. For example, CWC's Regional Training Center, Namma Bhoomi (Our Land) provides training in life skills, including vocational training in order to enhance the self-sustainability of the region.   For details go to `Interventions'.  

If  you are interested to access education and learning materials which have been developed on principles of CWC's Appropriate Education Programme (AEP), you can contact  www.i-learnings.com

The Centre for Applied Research and Documentation (CARD) was established (1989) in response to the need for an information base on the issue of Child labour. CARD aims to consolidate the work experience of the CWC and other grassroots organisations into transferable forms of information; forge links with other organisations for the purpose of advocacy; make interventions at the national level based on the information and experiences acquired at the field levels; and keep the issue of child labour alive, by focusing attention on the problem to find viable short and long term solutions in partnership with children.  

CWC as an organization is a little over 10 years old. Four distinct phases can be discerned in its operational history which are indicative of the size, style and pre-occupation of the group's activities over the decade. These can be broadly delineated as follows:  
  

CWC launched the Dhudio Makkala (Working Children's) Toofan programme in 1995. It is an attempt to prove that child labour can be addressed effectively even within the framework of the present level of development. CWC believes that the problem of child labour can be solved if state policies, strategies, infrastructure and personnel are strengthened and simultaneously if the constituency (in this case the working children themselves) are empowered to identify their problems, propose solutions and participate in an informed manner in all decisions regarding their lives and future.  

CWC is now working in four rural districts (eight panchayats) and two urban centres of Karnataka. In each of these areas CWC has enabled the formation of a Tripartite Task Force at the village and or ward level that consists of representatives of working children and their communities , Government representatives and Employers.  

Phase 5: For details, go to Interventions 

CWC has facilitated the coming together of working children as a union - Bhima Sangha - to fight their rights as workers and as children.  

Bhima Sangha is a union of, by and for working children. It has a membership of 13,000 working children in Karnataka. Since its inception in 1990, Bhima Sangha has been a powerful advocate for the rights of working children. It is equally concerned about improving the quality of life of the parents and communities of working children. In the eight Makkala Panchayat Toofan areas, Bhima Sangha has created a political space for itself through its participation in the Task Force. Bhima Sangha has been instrumental in setting up Makkala Panchayats.  

At the national and regional level, Bhima Sangha has links with other working children and is assisting them to form their own unions. Bhima Sangha conducts workshops for representatives of working children in which they provide information about child rights and unionisation of skills.  

Bhima Sangha was a member of the organising committee for the first international meeting of working children. It was one of the unions representing Asia in the child labour conferences at Amsterdam and Oslo.  

Bhima Sangha is one of the founding members of the International Movement of working children and is presently its Asian Regional Co-ordinator.  

Namma Sabha is a union of young artisans. After the members of Bhima Sangha turn 18 years old, they can opt for the membership of Namma Sabha. Namma Sabha is concerned with strengthening the professional base of its members in order to revive traditional and skill based occupation.  

It aims to create a child centered development model. In order to do so, it plays a supporting role to Bhima Sangha and to Makkala Panchayat. Namma Sabha is the bridge between Makkala Panchayat and the Formal Panchayats. Members of Namma Sabha have created a political space for themselves and will soon take on an active role in the local governments and in the main stream political scenario of the State.