ACHALPUR, July 17: Achalpur tehsil: just another of the million little towns that dot the Indian landscape; just another place where child labour abounds but officialdom seeks to hide it with the help of incorrect and false reports by bored and unconcerned officers. According to a survey conducted by the Achalpur Municipal Council, there are only three child labourers in the tehsil. Even the residents of the area are anguished over the allegedly bogus report.

To find out the gravity of the problem, this correspondent visited different parts of the town and interviewed a number of child labourers. It was observed that there were hundreds of child labourers in tehsil who were living a life of poverty, illiteracy and harassment.

Nine-year-old Dhanraj is a case in point. He was found washing cups and saucers in a restaurant in the locality. When the restaurant owner was asked about a bandage on Dhanraj's leg, he said Dhanraj had hurt himself while playing.

However, according to Dhanraj, the owner had torched him to stop him from playing with other children. Similar stories abounded in Hirapura, Biyabani, Devdi, Chavalmandi localities.

Children are employed for various jobs including cleaning of tin cans with an aqueous solution of caustic soda, preparation of manja from dust of glass bottles, dyeing of fabric, frying of papads, cutting tin sheets, cleaning acid bottles, baking bread, collecting meat from slaughter houses, picking bricks from kilns and even to carry petromax on their heads in marriage processions.

In about 22 restaurants, children belonging to the age group of 8 to 12 years, were found working as full time employees. The restaurant owners had forced them to stop studying. ``What is the need for education, I pay the boys Rs 50 per day,'' said one restaurant owner justifying his decision.

The child labourer survey team of the Municipal Council said that they had visited at least 88 shops amongst which was the restaurant that this correspondent had visited. Surprisingly, as per their survey, there was not a single instance of child labour in these places.

``We asked establishment owners if they employ children. They answer in the negative and an entry is made accordingly in the survey books,'' said an MC employee when asked how they had gone about the survey.

Brick kilns of Achalpur town are also filled with little children performing dangerous jobs, right from cleaning the earth to picking up the bricks from the hot furnace. These children often sustain burns on different parts of their body.

An owner of a kiln informed that if a child suffers burns ,``we apply ash on the wound and tie a bandage around it. The wound dries off within eight days''.

These children are seen roaming around the work sites, unkempt and unwashed for days together.

What was more heart rending was the callous attitude of the local administration which, though realising the gravity of the situation, had done nothing for the welfare of these little children.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.