I’m an undergraduate student who lives in Karachi, Pakistan, the area I belong child labor is the topmost problem of it besides any other problem. Children’s being pressurized to work and earn livings by neglecting their education. Now a days it’s been a trend that maids take jobs at 10 to 15 houses and divide some of the homes between their kids instead of sending them to schools/colleges. So, in Pakistan, there are millions of children working day and night instead of getting a proper education.
Now if we come to child labor, the word ‘child labor’ creates an image of child slaves in our minds, but that’s not a complete picture of it. Not all of the work children do is bad, e.g. Usually children or students do part-time jobs after schools/colleges and this isn’t harmful. It becomes a problem when it starts harming their physical, mental, and social health. It also becomes problematic when they have to leave their education for work. Therefore, child labor is the work that hinders the chances, dignity, and right to their education. And the main cause of child labor been found is poverty.
In June 2020 an incident happened in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. An eight-year-old domestic worker Zohra Shah was killed by a husband and a wife by mistakenly releasing couple two parrots from the cage (the couple was arrested and charged the same day).
To overcome this problem, we can donate as much as we can to the NGOs working on child labor or we can help any child financially by paying his/her fee or the least we can do is to create awareness about child labor and importance of children education.
Filza John, Karachi
