Child Worker

Don’t do him as a worker. Good feature to him from the school education. Child labor is a crime. Every child should want compulsory school education.

Mohan was 12 years old when he started to help his father deliver milk to homes on Koti road in Hyderabad. He used to accompany his father on his rounds and help in collecting and counting money.

He had just finished his primary school then and was about to go to a higher school to continue with his students when his father suddenly, fell ill. He was left with no option but to take care of the family business and follow in his father’s footsteps. After a brief hospitalization, Mohan’s father died. Mohan, being the eldest in the family, took over the family trade after his father’s untimely death and became the sole breadwinner of his family.

His typical workday was to get up early and milk the cows. By 6 am. , the milk had to be delivered. “Delivering milk those days was a difficult job as I had to walk for hours and reach the customers before the day got too hot’’ Mohan told  with his old school friends.

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His work became easier when he bought a bicycle a bicycle with the help of a loan from his uncle. “I began to expand my operations and began delivering milk into areas such as the cantonment’’, he said. However, this could not continue for long as he had to close his dairy farm in the city because of the government orders. When the family was told to vacate the land, they sold the animals and milk from other farms situated near Kukatapally. “But sadly, the profits have dwindled.’’

Today, Mohan regrets that he was not able to complete his high school education. He wises he had his family had got some support when there was a crisis. “Everyone talks about the issue of school drop-outs, but no one has any solution to this problem.’’