Herding cattle and weaving carpets, on city waste-heaps, at traffic lights, in roadside eateries, in farms and in factories, in brick kilns and coal mines, in brothels and in our homes, children of the poor work at an age when our own are in school or at play. What is remarkable is not just our collective acceptance of such diverging destinies of children merely because of the accident of where they...

Although India is a labour-surplus economy – with an unlimited number of workers willing to work at a subsistence wage – a paradoxical feature of the labour market is the rising incidence of scarcity or shortages amid a situation of potential plenty. No doubt, this pertains to skilled labour. But when 15 per cent of Indian trucks are idle owing to a shortage of drivers or India Inc is worried...

-The United Nations   A new report by the United Nations labour agency warns of a youth jobs crisis in both developed and developing countries, with young people aged 15 to 24 finding it increasingly difficult to obtain decent employment and future prospects are dim. As it released its “Global Employment Trends for Youth: 2011 Update,” the International Labour Organization (ILO) notes that the recent global economic crisis led to a “substantial” increase...

Fourteen-year-old Shafat Ahmad works as a domestic helper in the house of a Srinagar-based government employee in Kashmir. His younger sister embroiders shawls in an unregistered textile venture in her native village of Beeru. "When my father first brought me here, my employer promised to send me to school," Shafat told IPS. Though he is keen to pursue his education, he has yet to attend a single class. The Ahmed siblings' story...

Why were two tribals and the Essar group framed by the Chhattisgarh police? Why are Soni Sori and Linga Kodopi being systematically silenced? This chilling story of one family reveals more about India's Naxal crisis than any official document can. AS I sit to write this, at 12.20 pm on 4 October 2011, an SMS pops up on my phone: “Soni Sori has been arrested by the Delhi Crime Branch.” The...