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New hope for home helps

ILO scheme gives them a chance to education, health and training

ABDUL KADER
Unlike many other working children in Dhaka, 12-year-old girl Togor is lucky enough to work under an employer who possesses the sensitivity to let her have an access to education and other basic human rights.
A domestic help at Kayedtuli of old Dhaka, Togor's smiling face gives the impression that her life is not all about sadness or gloom. Work under an employer with a kind heart, coupled with the child labour elimination project of the
International Labour Organisation (ILO) has set her life well on track.
The ILO with a fund of Tk 2 crore from the US Department of Labour in January 2002 started the project aimed at providing 5,000 out of the estimated three lakh children working in domestic labour in the capital with access to education, health care and skill training.
Togor is one of the beneficiaries of the project.
Five different nongovernmental organisations (NGO) in Dhaka are working to
implement this project titled "Prevention and Elimination of the Worst Form of Child Labour in the Formal and Informal Sectors in Bangladesh".
The ILO may consider running this programme further, if Togor and other beneficiaries of this programme show the programme worked well in getting them properly educated, trained and equipped for the future. In that case, the rest of the children working as domestic helps in Dhaka and elsewhere may also expect a better future.
Togor enrolled in a non-formal education (NFE) school at Kayedtuli, Nayabazar in old town with the assistance of her employer for education and training.
Nearly 1000 child domestic helps in the old town get training from 28 NFE schools that are run by Palli Mongal Karmosuchi (PMK), an NGO. The children attend schools from 3pm to 5pm six days a week.
Togor and some other children so far have shown a lot of encouraging signs.
"I was totally illiterate two years ago, but now I can write my name, I can do some maths and I even have learnt some English,"said Togor, beaming with confidence.
She says she is now prodded by an ambition within her to be a doctor these days. She, however, knows the limitations as well and adds in despair, "who's going to help me become a doctor? I know it won't come true for me."
Rina Bishwas, the employer of Tagor, said, "Tagor is under my guardianship for the last two years. But she won't be with me forever and she has a future. So I decided to get her in to the non-formal education school. I don't face any problem with household work at all and I let her work only after school period."
Monira Akhter, another work-
ing child who is getting the ILO trainingsaid, "I think this opportunity should be given to all other domestic hands across Bangladesh."
Dewan Abdul Hashem, action programme coordinator of PMK said, "With this training the children have become even more skilled as workforce. They now work better for the employers as they have been trained in cooking, operating home appliances and also better manners and etiquette."
Hashem said one tenth of the children, who are older than 16 years, have been given a six-month training in tailoring to make them self-reliant.
Monir Hossain, the project monitor appointed by the ILO, said out of 5,000 child domestic workers, mostly girls, 500 children will be awarded certificates of professional house keepers by the ILO soon in a ceremony.
It will be easier then for those children to go abroad to take job of house housekeepers, he added.
ILO has extended this support with a view to improve the quality of life of the child domestic workers.
"But we will evaluate the performance of the NGOs in implementing the project before deciding on the continuation of the scheme in the future."