Call for joint efforts to end child labour

India has asked the international community to effectively address problems of poverty and unemployment to root out child labour, and warned that trade restrictions to raise labour standards would only reduce global trade. Child labour is a cause as well as consequence of poverty and “the problem cannot be addressed effectively without addressing squarely problems of poverty, unemployment and under-employment,” the Union Labour Minister, Mr. M.P. Veerendrakumar, told the International Child Labour Conference here on Wednesday.

‘India must sustain 7% growth to eliminate poverty’

The Finance Minister, Mr. P. Chidambaram, has said India has to sustain seven per cent growth in the near term and eight per cent thereafter to eliminate poverty in two decades. Addressing young Indian professionals here, he said the higher growth path had to be backed by sound and sensible policies, good governance and determination to stay on course. He said higher growth gave the Government the capacity to appropriate large amounts of money to address health and education. The State would intervene on the side of the poor and the disadvantaged.

CITU calls for strike on Dec 17

The CITU has given a call for a strike on December 17 in support of its demand for a new pension scheme for industrial workers. The strike is also in protest against privatisation of the power sector, the CITU General- Secretary, Mr. M.K. Pandhey, told newspersons at the end of the three-day meeting of CITU working committee here on Wednesday. He said industrial workers affected by the pension scheme introduced by the Union Government would strike work. He said “we want pension as a third benefit”.

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