The week gone by witnessed one of those days of the year again when there were thousands of weddings in Delhi alone — 34,000 weddings this year! I went to one such wedding, part of the groom’s entourage and as the baaraat was inching towards the venue I observed these boys holding the heavy light contraptions that were illuminating the baaraat. (Useless trivia: Did you notice the sentence almost had an oxymoron — ‘heavy’ and ‘light’?)
While the baaraatis danced till their feet got sore; the bandwaalas played till their lungs got sore; the dholwaalas beat their dhols till the hides got sore; these boys held the lights aloft till their backs got sore. And then they just bent their tender backs a little.
A little more…
And the visionary ‘enlightening’ employer…
Child labour banned — did you say? Asha Band says the same…
…Only spelled differently — Child labour band!
I say. Essay. Assay. ऐसे. 
Hi there Rahul,
Child Labour is a rather perturbing issue in South Asia. I think we need to take measures such as enforcing legislation and most importantly making sure that every child gets to the ladder of secondary education.
I don’t know about Indian Schooling but last time when I visited my family home in Pakistan, I went to an urban n rural school (while collecting some stats for an article in uni), there was a stark divide! More appalling is the contrast b/w private n public education. South Asia NEEDS to invest in human capital before it gets on wid anything else!
Hope u hv been doin good though*
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Hey Sobia!
In india they have banned employing of children under 14 years. But that’s on paper only, as this post clearly points out.
I am doing fine. Hope you doin’ well too?
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