Almost 17 million children aged between five and 17 years are engaged in child labour in South Asia with Bangladesh placed in the second position, according to a recent report of the International Labour Organisation (ILO).
The report says the highest 5.8 million child labour in the region is in India followed by 5.0 million in Bangladesh, 3.4 million in Pakistan and 2 million in Nepal.
However, in relative terms, children in Nepal face the highest risk of being in child labour.
One in five child labourers is aged 11 or below, says the report titled 'Measuring children's work in South Asia: Perspectives from national household surveys'.
The ILO conducted the first South Asia report on child labour and children's employment to provide an overview of the issue in South Asian based on data of the 2005-2012 period. The data was gathered through national household surveys in seven South Asian countries-Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, the Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
The report notes that the national surveys contain mainly information on hazardous work, but other worst forms of child labour including debt bondage, children in armed conflict, sexual exploitation and child domestic labour are also prevalent in the South Asian region.
The report found agriculture absorbing the highest percentage of children in employment ranging from 46 per cent in Bangladesh to 94 per cent in Nepal.
All the countries surveyed also reported a significant proportion of children who are neither in employment nor in school.
A total of 24 million are under-14 children in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh alone.
Out-of-school children are a 'formidable challenge' in the South Asia region, the report says.
"Millions of children across South Asia are trapped in child labour and millions more are missing from education. So the need for a massive and sustained response is urgent and critical," said Sherin Khan, Senior Child Labour Specialist at the ILO's Decent Work Team for South Asia.
The report recommended reinforcing efforts in rural areas and particularly for children in agriculture, incorporating child labour issues into social welfare and protection programmes, increasing public spending on basic education for both girls and boys, and more research on the relationship between work and school.
"The report is a wake-up call, reminding us that addressing child labour must be an urgent priority," said Corinne Vargha, Chief of ILO's Fundamental Labour Rights Programme in a publication.
The report also said more needs to be done to ensure that children who are old enough to be employed are not in hazardous work.
It called for more research on those children who are missing from the data (neither in school nor work), and particularly on the role of child marriage, forced labour, trafficking, sexual exploitation and exploitative domestic work.
smunima@yahoo.com
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