Kailash Satyarthi writes to Modi over drought-affected children

Nobel Peace laureate Kailash Satyarthi has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, drawing his attention to the suffering of approximately 16 crore children across the country due to severe drought.

The child rights activist requested Mr Modi to declare the drought a national emergency and initiate child-centric relief measures to ensure they are not forced into child labour or trafficked or compelled to leave school.

Claiming that almost Rs 10,000 crore was lying unspent in the corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds, out of which Rs 3,600 crore was from public sector undertakings, the founder of the Bachpan Bachao Andolan said at a press conference on Tuesday, “I demand that PM must direct the unspent amount in the CSR funds towards child-centric drought relief measures. Over 16.3 crore children from 10 states are affected by the severe drought situation. Owing to this drought and ongoing water crisis, the children are becoming increasingly vulnerable.”

“Reports of children being forced into child labour, trafficking, child marriage and the Devadasi system are coming to light with children increasingly dropping out from schools, discontinuation of mid-day meals and large scale migration,” he added. Stressing on the need for assessment of the impact of the ongoing drought on the children, the 62-year-old rights activist said in the coming months, there is an increased risk of lakhs of children becoming victims of these circumstances.

“In this context, I urgently request you being the Prime Minister as well as the ex-officio chairperson of the National Disaster Management Authority to make children a top priority in all relief, rehabilitation work and take immediate measures to declare drought as a national emergency, assess and analyse the effects of drought on children and ensure that no child in the drought-affected areas is forced into child labour, bonded labour, child marriage, or is trafficked or compelled to leave school,” he said.

Mr Satyarthi also demanded a dedicated session of Parliament to discuss the ongoing drought. “There should at least be a dedicated session of Parliament to discuss drought and during that well-known geographers and hydrologists should be called to find a permanent solution to this perpetual problem. There has to be utmost political will,” he said.

“Hope the Prime Minister listens to the mann ki baat of these 16.3 crore children,” he added.

According to Bachpan Bachao Andolan statistics, 35,873 children have gone missing, 22,014 abducted, 1,05,24,959 have been forced into child marriages while 74,84,416 have been pushed into child labour. However, he claimed these figures were based on government records.