Off to Work, Not to School

Every morning a swarm of children pours into the street in the Indian city of Tumakuru. They gather in front of a public housing apartment complex on the city’s outskirts. They’re not going to school in this industrial city in southern India. Instead of backpacks or books, each child carries a filthy plastic sack.

These children range from 6 to 14 years old. They’ve been sent by their parents to comb through garbage dumps. The area is littered with broken glass and concrete shards. The children spend their days searching for recyclable plastic. They earn a few cents per hour and most wear no gloves or masks. Many can’t afford shoes and make their rounds barefoot, with bleeding feet.

“I hate it,” says Rahul, an 11-year-old who’s among the group. But in March, India closed its schools because of the coronavirus pandemic. That meant Rahul, whose teachers praise him as a bright student, had to go to work.

This is happening in many parts of the developing world. School closures because of Covid-19 have put children on the streets. Families are desperate for money. Children are an easy source of cheap labor. While the United States and other developed countries debate the effectiveness of online schooling, hundreds of millions of children in poorer countries lack computers or the internet. Many of them have no schooling at all.

United Nations officials estimate that at least 24 million children will drop out of school and millions could be pressed into work. Ten-year-olds are now mining sand in Kenya and chopping weeds on cocoa plantations in West Africa. In Indonesia, boys and girls as young as 8 are painted silver and working as living statues who beg for money.

The surge in child labor could erode the progress achieved in recent years in school enrollment, literacy, social mobility, and children’s health.

“All the gains that have been made, all this work we have been doing, will be rolled back, especially in places like India,” says Cornelius Williams, a high-ranking UNICEF official.

United Nations officials estimate that at least 24 million children will drop out of school and millions could be pressed into work. Ten-year-olds are now mining sand in Kenya and chopping weeds on cocoa plantations in West Africa. In Indonesia, boys and girls as young as 8 are painted silver and working as living statues who beg for money.

The spike in child labor could chip away at the progress achieved in recent years. That would disrupt school enrollment, literacy, social mobility, and children’s health.

“All the gains that have been made, all this work we have been doing, will be rolled back, especially in places like India,” says Cornelius Williams, a high-ranking UNICEF official.

Child labor is just one piece of a looming global disaster. Severe hunger is devastating children from Afghanistan to South Sudan. Forced marriages for girls are rising across Africa and Asia, according to U.N. officials, as is child trafficking. Data from Uganda shows teen pregnancies are shooting up during pandemic-related school closures. Aid workers in Kenya say that many desperate families are sending their teenage girls into sex work to feed their families.

In Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, Surlina, 14, paints herself silver to resemble a statue and hangs around a gas station with an outstretched hand. Her mother is a maid, and her father sold small sculptures before the pandemic robbed him of his job. At the end of each day, she gives her earnings to her mother, who supplies her and her two siblings, 11 and 8, with the paint.

“I have no choice,” Surlina says. “This is my life. My family is poor. What else can I do?”

She sometimes tries to study from a sixth-grade workbook—she was going to school until it closed in March—but finds reading difficult.

“It makes me dizzy, and no one helps me,” Surlina says. “I just give up.”

In India, school-age children are now performing all kinds of work, from rolling cigarettes and stacking bricks to serving tea outside brothels, according to more than 50 interviews conducted with the children, their parents, teachers, labor contractors, and child activists. Most of it is illegal. Much of it is hazardous.

In Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, Surlina paints herself silver to resemble a statue. The 14-year-old girl hangs around a gas station with an outstretched hand. Her mother is a maid, and her father sold small sculptures before the pandemic robbed him of his job. At the end of each day, she gives her earnings to her mother, who supplies her and her two siblings, 11 and 8, with the paint.

“I have no choice,” Surlina says. “This is my life. My family is poor. What else can I do?”

She was going to school until it closed in March. Now, she sometimes tries to study from a sixth-grade workbook. She hasn’t been able to do more because she finds reading difficult.

“It makes me dizzy, and no one helps me,” Surlina says. “I just give up.”

In India, school-age children are now performing all kinds of work. They do everything from rolling cigarettes and stacking bricks to serving tea outside brothels, according to more than 50 interviews conducted with the children, their parents, teachers, labor contractors, and child activists. Most of the work is illegal. Much of it is hazardous.

Saurabh Kumar, a sixth-grader, comes from a struggling family in Jharkhand State. He works as a helper at a garage at the urging of his father. A few months ago, he tried to unfasten some sharp engine bolts and sliced his hand open.

“I could see down to the bone,” he says.

India already had a serious child labor problem because of high poverty levels and dependence on cheap labor. Fireworks and cigarette factories, textile sweatshops, and construction sites often employ children. The authorities had been cracking down and enrolling children, especially girls, in school.

But now, as Nahida Ismail, a teacher in Bihar State, says, “The whole ecosystem around kids is breaking down.”

On a construction site near Gaya, a town in Bihar, Mumtaz, 12, and his brother Shahnawaz, 10, struggle under heavy loads of gravel. With a face filled with sadness, Shahnawaz carries a bucket on top of his head. He squinches his eyes tight, looking like he’s about to cry. His skinny legs nearly buckle.

“I get headaches,” he says. “I can’t sleep at night. My body tingles.”

His older brother seems to have already seen his new future.

“I fear that even if school reopens, I will have to keep doing this, because
of the family’s debt,” Mumtaz says.

“I wanted to join the army,” he adds, using the past tense.

Many child experts say that once children drop out of school and start making money, it’s very difficult to get them back in school. India has ordered elementary and middle schools to remain closed indefinitely. That’s affected more than 200 million children. Some government teachers are making house calls and teaching in small groups. The central government has allowed high school students to visit teachers on campus. But many states have said no to that option.

Government officials say Covid-19 leaves them little choice. New infections in India remain high. Officials also say children at school would have difficulty maintaining social distancing.

“They can end up becoming vectors of virus,” says Rajesh Naithani, an adviser to the education ministry.

Child rights activists say it’s remarkable how little the school closures are being discussed. Speeches by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, and top ministers usually focus on opening up the economy, not the schools.

Meanwhile, many parents say they’re under tremendous pressure to put their out-of-school children to work.

“We need their wages,” says Mohammad Mustakim Ansari, an underemployed mason and the father of Mumtaz and Shahnawaz. “Without them, I wouldn’t be able to cobble together two meals.”

Employers can smell the desperation. The pandemic has caused India’s economy to shrink more than any other major economy. Wages are plummeting.

Biplab Das, a labor contractor in West Bengal State, says that parents keep arriving on his doorstep with school-age children. One morning in mid-September, a man showed up with his son and daughter, 12 and 8, respectively. Das says the children stood quietly in the doorway and looked at their father “like they were being prepared to be thrown into a fire.”

Das says he doesn’t find jobs for children because it’s illegal. But in this case, fearing the family might starve, he guided them to a truck stop that was looking for a tea server. The 12-year-old boy now works there, making the equivalent of about 7 cents an hour.

“They can end up becoming vectors of virus,” says Rajesh Naithani, an adviser to the education ministry.

Child rights activists say it’s remarkable how little the school closures are being discussed. Speeches by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, and top ministers usually focus on opening up the economy, not the schools.

Meanwhile, many parents say they’re under a lot of pressure to put their out-of-school children to work.

“We need their wages,” says Mohammad Mustakim Ansari, an underemployed mason and the father of Mumtaz and Shahnawaz. “Without them, I wouldn’t be able to cobble together two meals.”

Employers can smell the desperation. The pandemic has caused India’s economy to shrink more than any other major economy. Wages are quickly declining.

Biplab Das, a labor contractor in West Bengal State, says that parents keep arriving on his doorstep with school-age children. One morning in mid-September, a man showed up with his son and daughter, 12 and 8, respectively. Das says the children stood quietly in the doorway and looked at their father “like they were being prepared to be thrown into a fire.”

Das says he doesn’t find jobs for children because it’s illegal. But in this case, fearing the family might starve, he guided them to a truck stop that was looking for a tea server. The 12-year-old boy now works there, making the equivalent of about 7 cents an hour.

In India, children under 14 aren’t allowed to work unless it’s a family enterprise, like a farm, or in a few other rare circumstances, such as child acting. They’re barred from dangerous workplaces such as construction sites and cigarette factories. But UNICEF officials say that there are fewer workplace inspections because of the disruption caused by the pandemic.

For many children, it’s like their childhood has suddenly ended.

On a recent morning, Rahul, the 11-year-old from the public housing complex outside Tumakuru, gets ready to go to work with his father, Kempraju, a lifelong garbage scavenger from one of the lowest castes. Under India’s ancient caste system, people from lower castes are often stuck with menial jobs.

Kempraju says he knows the work is “not respectable,” but he wants to keep Rahul out of trouble and needs the extra hands.

“He sifts well,” he says as he watches Rahul pull a plastic bottle out of a refuse pit, flatten it, and drop it into his sack.

Jeffrey Gettleman and Suhasini Raj cover India for The New York Times.

Jeffrey Gettleman and Suhasini Raj cover India for The New York Times.