A School Named After Her—Still a Child Worker

Faisal Saleem

Khanewal: Eleven-year-old Arooj once gave her name to a classroom at a brick kiln near Rahman Garh, a small town in Khanewal. For a year, she attended the non-formal education center there—an effort meant to pull her away from labor and toward learning.

Then she disappeared from the classroom.

When teachers went looking for her, they learned that Arooj had been sent to Sargodha to work in a private home. The center that carried her name still exists, but the child it was meant to protect is no longer there—exposing the fragile line between education and exploitation faced by children trapped in poverty.

The non-formal education center was named after her—a gesture meant to inspire hope and signal a future shaped by learning rather than labor. 

“This is the painful irony we are witnessing,” says Misbah Farooq of the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child (SPARC), a civil society organization advocating for child rights across Pakistan.

According to Farooq, SPARC currently operates more than 50 non-formal education centers at brick kilns in four districts of the country. Each center is named after an enrolled child, a symbolic effort to motivate families and reinforce a sense of ownership over education—an effort that, in many cases, is still battling deeply entrenched poverty, coercion, and child labor.

Arooj’s father, Abdul Ghafoor, is a brick kiln laborer and the father of four children. Arooj is his eldest daughter and has been working in Sargodha for the past five months.

According to Abdul Ghafoor, he received thirty thousand rupees from the family as security, while he received seven thousand rupees per month as her salary. Her other expenses are borne by the same family.

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He stated that Arooj is only tasked with taking care of children, while other domestic chores are handled by additional workers in the house.

Abdul Ghafoor explained that from almost every brick kiln, five to seven children are sent to nearby or major cities for work. This process is facilitated by the jamadar (a person who organizes laborers at the kiln), who arranges domestic jobs for the children and delivers their monthly wages to their families.

Children as Collateral

He added that this is a compulsion, as thapair (raw brick molders) across the country do not receive wages in line with the officially fixed minimum labor rates. While struggling with health and other issues, they fall deeper into debt. As a result, to repay previous loans, they send their children to work and take advances from employers.

In this context, when Iqra, a resident of a brick kiln in Mehr Shah, was asked about her experience of working away from home. She said she is only ten to twelve years old and does not have the capacity to judge what is good or bad for her. When her parents told her to go, she went to work. 

She was made to work excessively. There were no fixed working hours, and food was provided in very small quantities. However, she considered herself fortunate that she was sent back after just three months.

Keeping this situation in view, visits were conducted to eight different brick kilns in Khanewal. It was found that 55 children aged between 8 and 18 years are working as domestic workers in homes across various cities, including Khanewal, Multan, Lahore, Islamabad, and Sargodha. Among them were 51 girls and 4 boys.

Of these children, 69 percent live permanently at their employers’ homes, while 31 percent return to their own homes after work, having found employment in nearby areas.

Among these children, 7 percent are aged between 8 and 10 years, 62 percent between 11 and 14 years, and 31 percent between 15 and 18 years.

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Wage-related data is equally alarming: 20 percent of children earn between Rs2,500 and 4,000 per month; 66 percent earn between Rs5,000 and 10,000; and 14 percent receive between Rs11,000 and 15,000.

Laws Exist, Child Labor Persists

According to experts, sending children from one city to another for domestic work is not merely domestic labor, but a form of forced displacement linked to human trafficking.

Pakistan, a country with a child population of 242 million, does not allow children under the age of 14 to work under Article 11 of its Constitution, which guarantees fundamental rights. The Punjab Domestic Workers Act 2019 prohibits employment of children under 15 years of age, while the Islamabad Domestic Workers Act 2022 bans all forms of work for children under 16 years. It also prohibits hazardous work for those aged between 15 and 18 years.

SPARC’s Executive Director, Asiya Arif, says the organization consistently promotes the principle of ensuring children’s access to their rights. Pakistan’s literacy rate stands at just 58 percent, higher only than Afghanistan in South Asia. 

Therefore SPARC is working through various projects to provide formal, non-formal, and technical education to children. Under the current project, more than 2,000 children living at brick kilns in Punjab and Sindh are being provided with non-formal education.

Labor Inspector Azka Saleem stated that domestic labor is one of the leading causes of domestic violence and is a form of bonded labor. In society, domestic labor is widely perceived as harmless. However, parents take advances and leave their children to work in homes or shops without the children’s consent. Under the Domestic Labor Act, no child under the age of 16 can be employed in any capacity.

The Labor Welfare Department does take action in such cases, but problems arise when the department registers an FIR and the parents refuse to pursue the case, thereby preventing further legal action. The underlying reason is the advance money taken from shopkeepers or homeowners and the severe economic hardship faced by poor families.

According to a joint statement released this year by UNICEF and the ILO, 138 million children worldwide are engaged in domestic work, including 28 million in the Asia-Pacific region, of whom 39 percent are involved in hazardous work. 

Homes That Exploit

Meanwhile, a report by the US Department of Labor states that in 2022, children were employed as domestic workers in every fourth household in Pakistan. In some cases, such work proves fatal, as illustrated by several incidents reported earlier this year.

According to the Punjab Child Labor Survey Report released in 2022, more than 13 percent of children aged 5 to 14 are engaged in domestic labor, while over 47 percent of children aged 10 to 14 are involved in hazardous work.

Dr. Akhtar Hussain, Project Director at Taleem Foundation, believes that domestic labor is a form of forced displacement and trafficking of children, in which the economic vulnerabilities of brick kiln families are exploited to send their children elsewhere for work in exchange for small sums of money. 

There, working hours, workload, health, and dignity are entirely dependent on the employer. In most places, children are made to work excessively. Their health and dignity are violated, and in some cases, they are subjected to violence, leading to loss of life. Parents are often threatened with silence.

Asiya Arif adds that separating underage children from their parents constitutes a violation of their rights and falls within the definition of forced displacement. It is the constitutional responsibility of the state to ensure free and compulsory education for all citizens aged five to sixteen so they can become productive members of society.

SDG 8 or Empty Promise? 

Similarly, under Sustainable Development Goal 8, discouraging all forms of child labor is a collective responsibility. However, equipping children with skills through technical education is a better solution so they can contribute positively to society. At the same time, it is essential to eliminate this trafficking-like form of forced child displacement.

Faisal Saleem is a PhD scholar in media studies and a freelance journalist. He likes to write about social, political, and climate challenges.