BELLARY: Deputy Commissioner Arvind Srivastav has instructed officials of the Labour Department to book cases against companies that have employed children.

Presiding over a meeting of the task-force committee for eradicating child labour in the district here on Wednesday, Mr. Srivastav said 259 children were engaged in hazardous occupations in the district and 2,001 in non-hazardous occupations. He wanted the officials to collect details of the children engaged in hazardous occupations and book cases against the employers besides initiating steps to send the rescued child labourers back to schools. The meeting was informed that according to a survey conducted by the Education Department this year, there were 9,233 children in the district. Of these, 7,795 were school dropouts and 1,438 were not admitted to school. There were 4,004 girl dropouts in the district and 723 girl children were not admitted to schools.

According to statistics, he said, Hospet taluk topped the list (145) with the highest number of child labourers engaged in hazardous occupation followed by Kudligi (74), Sandur (19), Bellary (15), Hadagali (4) and Sirguppa (2). Hospet taluk had as many as 424 children employed in non-hazardous occupations, followed by Hagari Bommanahalli (360), Hadagali (262), Bellary (259), Kudligi (193), Sirguppa (159) and Sandur (81).

Mr. Srivastav instructed the officials to complete the survey of child labour in cities before January 15 and asked them to appoint personnel and complete the process of imparting training to them before January 5.

He wanted the officials to conduct surprise inspections in schools for rescued child labourers run by non-governmental organisations. There are two such schools in Bellary, Sandur and Hospet and one each in Hadagali and Sirguppa.

The meeting was informed that the Labour Department this year had inspected 181 units and had rescued 31 child labourers besides booking a case and imposing a penalty up to Rs. 20,000. In division II of the Labour Department, 121 business and trade units were inspected and 15 children were admitted to schools. Mr. Srivastav, who instructed to close the school at Krishnanagar in Sandur taluk, asked the BEOs to shift the schools where they were necessary to serve the purpose for which they were opened. He suggested that the survey on child labour, already completed, be verified by the Department of Development Studies of the Kannada University.

The meeting decided to involve NCC, NSS volunteers, college students and artistes in "jathas" to create awareness among the public about the ban on engaging children as domestic help, from January 5.

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