Over 25,000 children are forced to work in the district to support their poverty-hit parents while there is no authority to control child labour. According to a survey recently conducted by an NGO, male and female children, under the age of 18 years, are working at factories, workshops, hotels, shops and even at roadside carts. The parents of these children are illiterate and don’t have any alternative source of income.
A cruel shape of it is bonded labour at brick kilns and at homes where the parents of such children receive money in advance from kiln owners and other employers and leave their dear ones at their mercy. Such children often earn Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000. Recently, a teenage girl was brutally murdered in the house of a former mayor of the city in mysterious circumstances. The situation at brick kilns is even worse. The Punjab government has been claiming 100% enrolment at primary level for the last three years. The predecessor government also made the same claims, but the ground reality is altogether different.
MAN KILLS SISTER-IN-LAW: A man shot dead his sister in-law for providing shelter to his angry wife at Qila Dedar Singh the other day. Reportdly, Sumera Bibi left her husband Muhammad Irfan and shifted to her sister Shamim Bibi’s house. On the day of the incident, Irfan came there and forced Sumera to return home. Shamim tried to calm down both of them. Irfan opened fire at Shamim, killing her instantly.
