The Hindu Business Line : Kerala to introduce Bill to ban child labour

The proposal is currently with the Law Department for vetting and it is expected to be introduced in the next Assembly session, according to the Labour Minister, Mr Babu Divakaran.

He told newspersons here on Saturday that the proposed Act seeks to ban engaging children below the age of 14 in any job. According to the guidelines of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), children below 14 years are not to be engaged in hazardous jobs. However, such instances had not been reported so far in the State, he noted.

The minister said there were several labourers from other States working in Kerala. Though there is a provision that migrant labourers, if in groups of a minimum of 20 members, should register themselves in the State, nobody had done it so far.

The Government had conducted programmes across the State to make migrant labourers aware of the labour laws applicable to them, he added.

The Government will introduce a housing scheme for plantation workers with the help of the local bodies. To begin with, it has drawn up a project for the construction of 100 houses.

He said nearly 30 labour laws were being handled by the Labour Department officials and some of these laws had become obsolete. The Government will suitably modify these laws keeping in mind the interests of entrepreneurs as well as workers.

The number of people, who are getting overseas employment through the Overseas Development and Employment Promotion Consultants, has been on the rise and in the current year, 177 people have got employment through the organisation. Further, following negotiations with the officials of the Saudi Government, an understanding has been reached for holding interviews in the State itself.

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