INDIA

MODERATE ADVANCEMENT

In 2023, India made moderate advancement in efforts to eliminate the worst forms of child labor. The
government extended its Fast Track Special Courts, which expedite the trial process for sexual offense cases,
including the commercial sexual exploitation of children. The Railway Protection Force and Government Railway
Police rescued 858 children from railway platforms, preventing them from being exploited for labor exploitation
or sex trafficking. Several states provided rehabilitation and financial assistance to 654 adult bonded labor survivors
and their immediate families. However, despite these efforts, the government’s existing hazardous work prohibitions
do not include all occupations in which children work in unsafe and unhealthy environments, and penalties for illegally employing children
are insufficient to deter violations. Prosecution rates for crimes related to the worst forms of child labor, including child trafficking,
remain low and the mistreatment of child labor victims by the police remains a concern. Through the enhanced enforcement of the
Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, the government continued to revoke the licenses of nongovernmental organizations and civil society
organizations, some of which work to address the worst forms of child labor.

PREVALENCE AND SECTORAL DISTRIBUTION OF CHILD LABOR

Statistics on Children’s Work and Education
Children Age Percent of Population
Working 5 to 14 1.0% (2,119,846)
Hazardous Work by Children 15 to 17 Unavailable
Attending School 5 to 14 90.7%
Combining Work and School 7 to 14 0.4%

Children in India are subjected to the worst forms of child labor, including commercial sexual exploitation, sometimes as a result of human
trafficking. Children also perform dangerous tasks in garment production, stone quarrying, and brickmaking.

Overview of Children’s Work by Sector and Activity

Agriculture Services
Producing hybrid cottonseed, cultivating cotton, Domestic work.† Working in restaurants, hotels, food
harvesting and processing sugarcane, transplanting rice service, and tourism services. Street work, including
seedlings, and performing peripheral work on farms, such as scavenging, sorting garbage, selling trinkets, and organized
removing weeds. begging. Working in automobile workshops and repairing vehicles.
Industry Categorical Worst Forms of Child Labor‡
Manufacturing garments, weaving silk fabric and carpets,† Forced labor in agriculture, including producing hybrid
producing raw silk thread (sericulture), spinning cotton cottonseed, making bricks, quarrying stones, and in rice
thread and yarn, and embellishing textiles with silver and gold mills. Forced labor in garments, embroidering silver and gold
(zari).† Quarrying and breaking stone and sandstone,† producing into textiles (zari), domestic work, and begging. Commercial
bricks,† recovering metals from electronic waste (e-waste),† and sexual exploitation, sometimes as a result of human trafficking.
mining and collecting mica.† Polishing gems† and manufacturing Recruitment of children by non-state armed groups for use in
glass bangles,† locks,† and brassware.† Rolling cigarettes (bidis)† armed conflict.
and manufacturing incense sticks (agarbatti), fireworks,† and † Determined by national law or regulation as hazardous and, as such, relevant to
matches.† Manufacturing footwear; producing leather goods and Article 3(d) of ILO C. 182.
accessories,† and stitching soccer balls. ‡ Child labor understood as the worst forms of child labor per se under Article
3(a)–(c) of ILO C. 182.

SUGGESTED GOVERNMENT ACTIONS TO ELIMINATE CHILD LABOR

The suggested government actions below would close gaps USDOL has identified in India’s implementation of its international
commitments to eliminate the worst forms of child labor.

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Legal Framework
Include in the list of hazardous work prohibited for all children all sectors in which children work in unsafe and unhealthy conditions,
such as spinning mills, garment production, carpet making, and domestic work.
Amend child trafficking laws so they do not require threats, the use of force, or coercion to be established for the crime of child
trafficking.
Publish the legal instrument that establishes the minimum age for voluntary recruitment into India’s armed forces.
Encourage all states and union territories to enact rules to implement the Occupational, Safety, Health, and Working Conditions Code to
ensure protection of children from hazardous forms of work.
Enforcement
Employ at least 35,668 labor inspectors to ensure adequate coverage of the labor force of approximately 535 million people, and publish
national data related to labor law enforcement.
Provide adequate training to labor inspectors and criminal investigators on child labor in all states and union territories, including on the
new Occupational, Safety, Health, and Working Conditions Code.
Fast track bonded labor cases and consistently impose penalties for violations.
Provide states and union territories with dedicated and sufficient funding, staff, and infrastructure to establish anti-human trafficking
units.
Ensure that all cases under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and Fast Track Special Courts adhere to their mandated
1-year timeline for prosecution, that backlogs of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences cases are adjudicated with priority, and that
judges and prosecutors at these courts are adequately trained to handle child sex crimes.
Hold accountable public officials who facilitate, participate in, or hinder efforts to address the worst forms of child labor, including
officials who accept bribes, hold children in bonded labor in agriculture and in brick kilns, and who delay registering human trafficking
cases or mistreat human trafficking survivors.
Prosecute and hold accountable perpetrators of the Jogini system to protect girls from lower castes from being sold to local deities for
sexual exploitation in return for in-kind payments or cash allowances.
Government Policies
Ensure that activities are undertaken to implement the National Plan of Action for Children and State Action Plans on Child Labor and
publish results from activities undertaken to implement these plans annually.
Encourage states and territories that do not currently have action plans for the elimination of child labor to establish such plans.
Social Programs
Reduce barriers and promote access to education for all children, including for low-caste Hindus, members of tribal communities,
religious minorities, and other disadvantaged communities by providing sufficient training for teachers, providing separate and sanitary
washrooms for girls, and increasing the number of available schools, especially in urban slums in which inadequate infrastructure
options limit access to education.
Collect and make available to the public data on exploitative child labor in every state, including findings from district-level bonded labor
surveys and raw data from the national census.
Ensure that state governments issue release certificates and provide financial assistance for bonded labor victims, including full
compensation for those freed from bonded labor, through the Central Sector Scheme for Rehabilitation of Bonded Laborers.
Provide rescued child labor victims with adequate social services to prevent their re-entry to the labor market, including through
educational re-entry programs.
Ensure that the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act is not used to prevent child labor-focused nongovernmental organizations from
obtaining international funding or preserving their licenses to operate in the country.
Provide all states and union territories with funding for human trafficking shelters in a timely and consistent manner.
Develop and implement social programs to address child labor, bonded child labor, and child trafficking among vulnerable populations
in India, including religious minorities and migrant children.

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CHILDREN AT HIGHER RISK

In India, migrant children, low-caste children, and religious minorities are vulnerable to child labor, commercial sexual exploitation,
and familial debt bondage. Girls from such disadvantaged communities are vulnerable to forced and bonded labor in the home-
based garment sector. Caste-based discrimination and poverty renders Dalit children especially vulnerable to child labor. Children are
vulnerable to labor exploitation in sectors in which adults from marginalized castes face labor exploitation, such as shrimp processing
in Adhra Pradesh, where children reportedly accompany their families in debt bondage. In some cases, girls from the Dalit community
are particularly vulnerable to exploitation. Furthermore, climate change in India is pushing more children into child labor as children
drop out of school to help their parents make up livelihoods lost to extreme weather events. Maoist groups reportedly forcibly recruit
children in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand to handle weapons, serve as human shields, and for use as cooks, porters, and informants in
armed conflict. Reports indicate that some non-state armed groups recruit girls for sexual exploitation, including practices indicative of
sexual slavery.

BARRIERS TO EDUCATION ACCESS

In India, school budgetary constraints, inadequate transportation for children in rural areas, a lack of separate and sanitary washrooms
for female students, and inadequate infrastructure in existing schools present barriers to education access. Limited direct recruitment
for teaching jobs and a cumbersome teacher recruitment process has led to high pupil-teacher ratios, severe teacher vacancies, and a
non-availability of teachers with subject matter expertise, adversely impacting quality of education. Lower-caste Hindu children, members
of tribal communities, and religious minorities face discrimination and harassment by education officials. Lower-caste children in some
schools are segregated from other students, given less food than higher-caste students, relegated to seats in the back of classrooms, and
assigned tasks like cleaning toilets during the school day.

LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR CHILD LABOR

India has ratified all key international conventions concerning child labor. However, India’s legal framework regarding the prohibition
of child trafficking does not meet international standards because the law requires the use of force, fraud, or coercion to establish child
trafficking offenses.

Meets
Child Labor Laws and Regulations International Legislation
Standards
Minimum Age for Work, 14 Years Section 3(1) of the Child and Adolescent Labor (Prohibition and Regulation)
Amendment Act
Minimum Age for Hazardous Work, Section 3A of the Child and Adolescent Labor (Prohibition and Regulation) Act
18 Years
Identification of Hazardous Schedule to the Child and Adolescent Labor (Prohibition and Regulation) Act;
Occupations or Activities Prohibited The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code
for Children
Prohibition of Slavery, Debt Bondage, Sections 2(g), 4, and 16–19 of the Bonded Labor System (Abolition) Act; Sections
and Forced Labor 138(4), 141, 143, and 144 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita; Section 79 of the
Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act
Prohibition of Child Trafficking Sections 139 and 141 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita; Sections 2, 5, 5A, and 5B of
the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act; Article 23 of the Constitution

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INDIA | MODERATE ADVANCEMENT
Legal Framework for Child Labor (Cont.)
Meets
Child Labor Laws and Regulations International Legislation
Standards
Prohibition of Commercial Sexual Sections 93, 94, 96, 97, 139, and 142 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita; Sections
Exploitation of Children 4–6 of the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act; Sections 13 and 14 of the Protection
of Children from Sexual Offences Act; Section 67B of the Information
Technology Act
Prohibition of Using Children in Illicit Sections 76, 78, and 83(2) of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of
Activities Children) Act; Sections 15–18, 20–23, and 32B(c) of the Narcotic Drugs and
Psychotropic Substance Act; Section 93 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita
Minimum Age for Voluntary State Codified Military Rules
Military Recruitment, 16 Years
Prohibition of Compulsory
Recruitment of Children by (State)
N/A*
Military
Prohibition of Military Recruitment by Section 1(2) and 83 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act
Non-state Armed Groups
Compulsory Education Age, 14 Years Section 3 of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act

Free Public Education Section 3 of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act

* Country has no conscription

India’s new criminal code, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, went into effect in 2024. India’s hazardous work regulations for children ages
14 to 18—established in the country’s Occupational, Safety, Health, and Working Conditions (OSH) Code—do not include all sectors in
which children are known to work, including spinning mills, garment production, and carpet making, which expose children to dangerous
machinery and difficult working conditions, including long hours. The OSH Code has not been universally adopted at the state level and the
deadline for state-level adoption remains unknown, rendering children in some states vulnerable to child labor. The OSH Code only applies
to institutions with 10 or more employees, leaving workers in smaller workplaces unprotected. India’s child trafficking laws do not meet
international standards as they require the use of force, fraud, or coercion to establish child trafficking offenses. Although sources report
that the minimum age for voluntary recruitment into India’s Armed Forces is age 16 and that individuals must be age 18 to be deployed,
these legal provisions are not publicly available and could not be verified.

ENFORCEMENT OF LAWS ON CHILD LABOR

In 2023, labor and criminal law enforcement agencies in India took actions to address child labor. However, alleged corruption in state
police forces, a lack of training of enforcement personnel, and the absence of standard operating procedures in certain states hindered
enforcement efforts.

Agencies Responsible for Child Labor Law Enforcement

State Government Labor Ministries: Each state has its own labor ministry that employs labor inspectors responsible for the enforcement
of labor laws. State ministries conduct labor inspections, including inspections for child labor, and assess penalties for violations.
Ministries refer children to child welfare committees for protection and rehabilitation services when child workers are identified and
removed from work.

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Criminal Law Enforcement Agencies: Enforce laws pertaining to the worst forms of child labor. State and local police submit information
to District Magistrates to determine whether a case should be prosecuted in District Court. Police refer children found in child labor
situations to child welfare committees for protection and rehabilitation services. Anti-Human Trafficking Units, which are reportedly not
fully operational or established in all states, function under district police headquarters and provide intelligence gathering on human
trafficking cases. Cases that fall under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, including the commercial sexual exploitation
of children, are referred to Fast Track Special Courts (FTSCs), which are mandated to prosecute offenders within 1 year. A backlog of cases
and insufficient training of personnel, however, prevents the courts from complying with this timeline. Reportedly, some police do not
follow protocol in child trafficking investigations and state authorities have ordered police to register these cases as kidnapping or missing
persons cases to reduce the number of human trafficking cases in official statistics.

Enforcement Mechanisms and Efforts

Has a Labor Inspectorate Yes Has a Complaint Mechanism Yes
Able to Assess Civil Penalties Yes Imposed Penalties for Child Labor Violations Unknown
Routinely Conducted Worksite Inspections Unknown Conducted Criminal Investigations for Worst Forms Yes
of Child Labor Crimes
Unannounced Inspections Permitted Yes Imposed Penalties for Worst Forms of Child Labor Unknown
Crimes
It is unknown how many labor inspectors conducted worksite inspections, or whether child labor violations were found. In addition,
although investigations into suspected cases of the worst forms of child labor were conducted, the total number of investigations is
unknown. However, the Government of India reported that 609 prosecutions were initiated, and 181 perpetrators—including cases
pending from previous years—were convicted for suspected worst forms of child labor crimes.

COORDINATION, POLICIES, AND PROGRAMS

Key Mechanism to Coordinate Child Labor Coordinating Bodies: Led by the Ministry of Labor and Employment (MOLE), the
Government Efforts on Task Force to Implement the Child Labor Act (CLA) comprises 12 officials from the federal and
Child Labor state governments. In 2023, the task force met three times and instructed states to closely
monitor child labor issues to ensure the implementation of the CLA. The Central Advisory Board
India established a mechanism to on Child and Adolescent Labor monitors the implementation of existing legislation and programs
coordinate its efforts to address related to child labor. The board met once during the reporting period; the outcome of the
child labor. meeting, however, is unknown. In 2023, MOLE released a standard operating procedure to
assign responsibilities to different government departments to tackle child labor and bonded
labor concerns.
Key Policies Related to National Policy on Child Labor: Overseen by MOLE and the Ministry of Women and Child
Child Labor Development. Aims to address child labor and includes activities for the provision of assistance
to children. Under the policy, the Platform for Effective Enforcement for No Child Labor (PENCIL)
India established policies related to Portal was developed and implemented. The PENCIL Portal incorporates a child tracking filing
child labor. However, states have not system to enhance enforcement of child labor laws, including the Child Labor Act, and provides a
uniformly established action plans to complaint mechanism for citizens to report child labor violations. Since 2017, The PENCIL portal
eliminate child labor, and reporting has removed 144,021 children from child labor.
on actions undertaken to implement
policies is limited. National Plan of Action for Children: Identifies priority actions for achieving the objectives set
out in the National Policy for Children, including age-appropriate classes for children released
from child labor and child trafficking. Also seeks to develop community-based prevention,
identification and release procedures, victim services, and reintegration mechanisms, as well as
strengthen institutions to address the worst forms of child labor. Research was unable to identify
specific activities carried out under this policy during the reporting period.

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Coordination, Policies, and Programs (Cont.)

Key Policies Related to State Action Plans on Child Labor: State- and union territory-specific plans to address and
Child Labor eliminate child labor. Exist in only 11 out of 28 states. In 2023, the Government of Odisha
published actions undertaken to implement its Plan, which included child labor prevention
trainings for employers, publishing data on inspections conducted under the Child and
Adolescent Labor Act, and collaborative activities with NGOs. The Delhi government collaborated
with local resident welfare associations to address child labor in the state’s domestic sector. In
addition, Bihar’s State Child Labor Commission rescued 795 children from child labor through
effective coordination and enforcement mechanisms. States do not uniformly report on actions
undertaken to implement action plans.
Key Social Programs to National Child Labor Project (NCLP) Scheme and Special Training Centers (STCs):† MOLE
Address Child Labor program operating at the district level to identify working children, remove them from work,
and provide them with education and vocational training. Comprises approximately 3,000
India funded and participated in NCLP STCs that provide children with support including stipends, meals, and health checkups.
programs that include the goal of From April 2022 to March 2023, the NCLP STC program removed 13,761 children from child
eliminating or preventing child labor and provided services to victims. Observers note that since the merging of the NCLP
labor. However, shelters providing with the Samagara Shiksha Abhiyan scheme—a program focused on achieving universal
assistance to victims of the worst elementary education—many children have re-entered the labor market as local schools cannot
forms of child labor lack financial accommodate all released children and do not provide the services that former child laborers
and human resources. require.
Central Sector Scheme for Rehabilitation of Bonded Laborers:† MOLE program that provides
released bonded laborers with financial assistance and social protection services, and funds
district-level surveys on bonded labor prevalence. In 2022–2023, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, and
Tamil Nadu cumulatively provided rehabilitation assistance to 654 survivors. Although reporting
did not indicate how many of these survivors were children, intergenerational debt bondage is
common in India—thus, removing parents from bonded labor likely protects their children from
bonded labor as well. Research did not yield information on the remainder of the states’ efforts to
rehabilitate bonded labor survivors. Some state governments lack standard operating procedures
to implement this scheme and failed to issue release certificates, and some failed to provide
adequate financial assistance to bonded labor victims without significant support from NGOs.
Anti-Human Trafficking Activities:† Government-operated anti-trafficking shelters, run in
collaboration with NGOs and state governments. Shelters include government-run juvenile justice
homes and government-run women and children’s homes. The Ministry of Women and Child
Development-funded Ujjawala and Swadhar Greh schemes provide services to and repatriate
human trafficking survivors, including children. In 2023, the Ujjawala and Swadhar Greh schemes
merged to create the Shakti Sadan scheme, an integrated relief and services program. The
scheme provides shelter, food, clothing, and primary health for female and child victims of
human trafficking. Although government-supported shelters were active during the reporting
† Program is funded by the Government period, observers reported that the shelters have not received adequate funding in over 2 years,
of India. and many operated at a deficit in 2023.
For information about USDOL’s projects to address child labor around the world, visit dol.gov/ILABprojects

WORKER RIGHTS SPOTLIGHT

In India, workers face obstacles forming and maintaining unions. These obstacles include provisions requiring at least 100 workers or
10 percent of the workforce (whichever is lower) is represented in the union; a lack of collective bargaining rights for civil servants; the
illegality of strikes in Kerala; and the illegality of strikes regarding essential services in Tamil Nadu.
For references, please visit dol.gov/ChildLaborReports

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