45 bonded labourers rescued from a brick kiln in Karnataka’s Kolar district

A total of forty five bonded labourers, including nine children and eight women, were rescued from a brick kiln at Hashodaya village in Kolar district, about 60 kms from Bangalore.

The bonded labourers, all migrants from three villages of Orissa, were working under inhuman conditions and kept locked during their free time. Having to make do with just two square meals a day, each labourer was paid a pittance of Rs 40 for manufacturing 1,000 bricks from 6 am to 10 pm, officials said.

A labour contractor had sent the labourers, who had migrated to Bangalore to escape poverty in their native villages, to the brick factory about four months ago. Labourers had been paid about Rs 3,000 as advance payment and the amount was being gradually deducted from their weekly wages, which barely crossed Rs 200.

The rescue of the bonded labourers came after officials of the Labour Department, accompanied by a posse of policemen, raided the brick kiln on Tuesday afternoon. The raid was carried out following a report by Action Aid, a non-Governmental organization, on the inhuman conditions in which labourers were working at the brick kiln. Action Aid’s report was based on the statement given by a labourer, who had managed to escape from the brick kiln.

The owner of the brick kiln Channappa Gowda is absconding. Deputy Labour Commissioner Vasanthkumar told reporters that the employer had violated many laws including the Minimum Wages Act, Payment of Wages Act, Inter State Migrant Workers’ Act and Child Labour Prohibition Act.

The rescued bonded labourers were taken to a Government hospital in Chikkaballapur. They were later sent to a shelter run by a Human Rights organization from where they will be sent back to their respective villages in Orissa, said Executive Director of South India Cell for Human Rights Education and Monitoring (SICHREM) Philip Mathew.