Kathmandu, January 25:

The International Labour Organization (ILO) approved eight new action programmes worth Rs 36.44 million to combat child labour and to support freed Kamaiya and Haruwa/Charuwa adults and their children, ILO said in a statement today. The United State Department of Labour (USDoL) will fund the programmes.

“The programme will address at least 9,600 children of freed Kamaiya and Haruwa/Charuwa will be mainstreamed into formal education or Out of School Programmes (OSP). Whereas, older children will receive Non Formal Education (NFE) and pre-vocational education.

“It will also cover functional literacy training, vocational education and group dynamics-training for 1,600 freed Kamaiya and Haruwa/Charuwa adults. The projects also support the withdrawal of 3,000 children working as Kamalhari and child domestics under the former Kamaiya and Haruwa/Charuwa system and will assist their re-integration into their communities.

“The work with freed Kamaiyas and their children will take place in Dang, Banke, Bardia, Kailali and Kanchanpur districts. Support for the Haruwa/Charuwa will be in Dhanusha, Siraha and Saptari districts,” the statement said.

The programmes are sub-contracted through the ILO-IPEC Project on Sustainable Elimination of Child Bonded Labour in Nepal, and will implemented by local groups, including Rural Access Development and Research-RADAR, Dang; Active Forum for Human Rights Awareness-AFHA, Banke; United Youth Community-UNYC Nepal, Bardiya; Creation of Creative Society-CCS, Kailali; Rural Women Development and Unity Centre-RUWDUC, Kanchanpur; Aasaman Nepal, Dhanusha; Srijana Community Development Centre (SCDC), Siarha and Shreepurraj Community Development Centre-SCDC, Saptari.

All programmes are aimed at creating an environment for sustainable elimination of child bonded labour here, within the four-year duration of the project.