Child Labour Situation in Mushar Community (A Case Study of Bishahariya VDC of Saptari)

Abstract

Child labour is a major universal social problem. The form of child labour ranges from domestic work to the industrial work prevailing in all developed and developing countries of the world. Child labour, a source of cheap labour is in high rate in countries like Nepal where a major part of population depends on agriculture. Using the data collected from child labours, this study attempts the status of Mushar child labour existing in Bishahariya VDC of Saptari district. The objectives of this study were to examine the background characteristics of child labour along with finding the causes and working status of child labour. It is based on the primary data collected from the interview of 132 child labour respondents (72 males and 60 females) selected by purposive sampling. In this study child labours interviewed were from age 8 years to 14 years with majority of children of age 13-14 years. Most of the child labours interviewed were found to work in brick kiln and agriculture sector either seasonally, occasionally or regularly. Most of them were found to work seasonally which may be due to the reason that brick kiln and agricultural works run only in certain seasons. Working hour of these children varied from less than 5 hours to 10-12 hours a day. Majority of respondents were found to work for 5-8 hours a day. Their salaries also varied between Rs. 1000-5000 per month with majority of respondents getting salary between Rs. 2000-3000 per month. Perception about their work showed that about 89 percent of them are satisfied with their job while 11 percent were not satisfied. The dissatisfaction due to low wage was about 47 percent. Mostly the children who work contributed to their family’s income. Most of them contribute to buy food along with supporting to pay back debt of family and paying school fees. Analysing the reason of work, majority of them had debts in their family which shows their poor economic condition. The actual reason for child labour was found to be poverty along with debt problems on them. Keywords: Child labour, Mushar, Caste discrimination.