Krishnagiri: The life of minor girls is a miserable one in the scenic remote uphill village of Tholuvabetta having the back drop of a lush green forest and located inside the Cauvery north wildlife sanctuary in Denkannikottai taluk of Krishnagiri.
The village has around 80 houses and lacks in facilities including road, transport, safe drinking water, health, hygienic living conditions and most importantly, higher education. Not a single home in this village is spared from sending their children to work as bonded labours. This was highlighted by B.Sivarathana, a part-time lady teacher for the government middle school in her native Tholuvabetta.
“Mallikamma is a recent dropout from our school. This 12 year old girl was studying in the eighth standard when she stopped coming to school since July this year. Her parents have sent the girl to work in a spinning mill in Erode like other children of our village,” Sivarathana told DC.
Twenty year old married Sivarathana receives Rs 20,000 as a monthly salary, not from the exchequer of the district education department, but personally paid by other government teachers in her school. Another two thousand rupees is paid to her by the Rural Development Council (RDC), an NGO. “You cannot find a single home in our village without boys or girls sent to work as bonded labourers in spinning mills by their poor illiterate parents,” Sivarathana says.
The part-time teacher added, “The children are subjected to many brutalities like long working hours, sexual abuse and working in a hazardous atmosphere, leading to illness as in my husband’s case”.
Her 25 year old husband M.Basavaraj studied till the eighth standard in the Tholuvabetta government school and went to work in the spinning mills when he was just 15 years old. He worked for around eight years and returned ill to Tholuvabetta. “My husband returned home when he was twenty three years old and became sick in a few weeks of our marriage. His medical reports showed that he had TB case and he is now under medication,” Sivarathana said tearfully.
According to Sivarathana, most children return home after the contract period with some respiratory issues like asthma or TB. Others are physically weak and cannot live without medical support after a few years of their return to Tholuvabetta.
