PICKETS | ChildLabourFreeMica

Prevention and protection from child labour

Through our flagship Bal Mitra Gram programme, we are creating a holisitc child protection environment in the intervention areas where all children are in school and no child is involved in child labour.

Participation

Ensuring the participation of children and community members in the decision-making processes. This will allow the decisions to be taken in the favour of the communities and the children, ensuring development.

Policy

Working with the government on policies to legalize mica mining without harming the environment to provide a stable source of income for the locals.
Working on policies for the formation of cooperatives for legally selling mica to the traders. This will help create a group of local individuals with collective bargaining power, thus preventing the exploitation of individuals by the traders. The cooperatives will be able to decide the selling price of the mica and sell the product to the highest bidder in the market.

Partnership

Harnessing the culture of partnership and working hand in hand with the community, local government, local NGOs, traders, processing units and exporters to ensure that there is no child labour in the mica supply chain.

Institutions

Formation and strengthening of child protection institutions at state, district and panchayat levels. Ensuring that bodies like village-level child protection committees (VLCPCs), school management committees (SMCs), and others are formed.

Investment

Reaching out to global businesses that invest in mica to convince them to increase the price of mica. This will help increase the income of mica-dependent communities, thus automatically reducing child labour.

Encouraging more investment by the government in infrastructural development of mica-dependent villages by construction of more schools, roads and water supply.

Community empowerment and access to government schemes

The development of a village depends on the empowerment of the community members. Through our awareness generation programmes, we inform the community members about their rights and encourage them to be a part of the decision making process. Additionally, we act as a bridge between the community and the government helping the community members link with government welfare programs.

Communication

Communicating with the government and the community members and acting as a bridge between the two to ensure overall development of the villages and child protection.

Convergence

Ensuring convergence of different government welfare programmes on health, education, and child protection so that vulnerable children and communities get all the government benefits and are prevented from exploitation.

Capacity Building

Building capacity of local child protection institutions like village level child protection committees (VLCPCs), para legal volunteers and others for a robust child protection framework.

Knowledge

nhancing knowledge of the community, traders, businessmen and other stakeholders through robust resources, enabling them for data-driven decision-making. Generating awareness among the community about the ill effects of child labour and other forms of child exploitation. Also, spreading awareness about the various government programmes and welfare schemes for the betterment of the community.

Education

Ensuring education for every child in the community as it will directly help in curbing child exploitation. This includes better school infrastructure, ensuring access to school for children by cycle distribution, promoting direct cash transfer under various government welfare programmes to supplement the income of the families, and more.

Economic Development

Developing a culture where the economic dependence of the community members can be diverted or supplemented with other sources of income along with mica collection. Promoting the formation of cooperatives for selling mica to ensure that the right price is being paid to all involved in mica collection.

Enforcement of Law

Promoting law enforcement against illegal mica trading and child labour in mica mining to create a legal deterrence.

Environment

Conserving the environment is a key focus area. We promote plantation drives and cleanliness drives, and work towards making the community members aware about the benefits of environment preservation.