From Times Of India Dt.19th August-09

31 minor migrants tortured at workplace
Satyanarayan Pattnaik, TNN 18 August 2009, 10:11pm IST


KORAPUT: Parents of 31 teenaged migrant labourers have written to the district administration detailing how their children are working in inhuman
conditions in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. According to them, the children are being subjected to cruelty and torture almost everyday at their workplaces.

The facts came to light when the parents, all natives of Koraput's Ghumar panchayat, went to police and asked them to rescue the children, all aged between 12 and 17 years, from the clutches of some "unscrupulous contractors".

A few months ago, three contractors promised good money and persuaded these families to allow their children to work in these two states. First, the children were taken to Guntur in Andhra Pradesh. "From there 13, were forced to go to Nelari in Karnataka where they were engaged at a construction site," said a villager.

"They told us that we will work at Guntur. But they took us to Nelari. There life was painful. Food was bad and they did not give us any wages. Often they would beat us up us. When we asked for wages, they'd say the contractors had been given the full amount," said Adu Bhatra, one of the labourers, who managed to flee.

"We are probing the matter and searching for the middlemen. The problem is that the two labourers, who escaped, have failed to give us information on where they worked," a police officer said.