Street children in India
has become his or her habitual abode and/or source of livelihood; and who is inadequately protected, supervised, or directed by responsible adults".
[1] India has an estimated one hundred thousand or more street children in each of the following cities: New Delhi, Kolkata, and Mumbai.
[2] Mainly because of family conflict, they come to live on the streets and take on the full responsibilities of caring for themselves, including working to provide for and protecting themselves.
has become his or her habitual abode and/or source of livelihood; and who is inadequately protected, supervised, or directed by responsible adults".
[4] While 18 million children work on the streets of India,[7] it is estimated that only 5–20 percent of them are truly homeless and disconnected from their families.
[10] Of the 50,000 people in India that are officially reported as leaving home annually, 45 percent are under 16; this number, though, is likely very low.
[3] Because it is difficult to obtain precise and accurate statistics about street children, information about their ages is approximate.
[4] The mean age of street children in a National Institute of Urban Affairs study in 1989 was 13 years.
[3] Most children who leave home to live on the streets come from slums or low cost housing, both of which are areas of high illiteracy, drug use, and unemployment.
[4] In Bombay, 50,000 children are illegally employed by 11,750 hotels, restaurants, canteens, tea shops, and eating places.
[11] Because of street children's lack of protection from a family and the law, employers often exploit them, making them virtual prisoners, sometimes withholding pay, and abusing them.
[3] Because of the low pay from employers, street children in India often choose to be self-employed or work multiple jobs.
[4] One of the most common economic activities done by the children is scavenging for recyclable materials, such as plastic, paper, and metal.
[8] While children occasionally send some of their earnings home to their families, they spend most of their extra money on entertainment.
Also, the boys among them do not mind wandering fully or partially naked in public because it adds to the people's sympathy for them.
[8] In fact, many children in the 2004 study said that one of the reasons they ran away from home was because they did not want to be forced to work and were unable to attend school.
[13] While the majority of street children in India have been found to use positive coping mechanisms to deal with the stress of their lives, some choose maladaptive strategies, such as drinking alcohol, using drugs, and visiting prostitutes.
[12] Street children in Bombay report relying on their friends for help when they are sick, money when they run out, and information about work when they need a job.
[8] Street children in India face additional vulnerability because of their lack of access to nutritious food, sanitation, and medical care.
Open air bathing of street children is in fact a very common sight in all parts of India.
[11] Most of the street children in India also lack access to medical care, which is especially detrimental during times of illness or injury.
[3][4] The primary cause for this treatment is the views that the police and general public hold toward them: most scorn them and react to them with hostility.
[3][4][10] Many street children have reported that police will beat them in order to coerce them into giving them a "cut" for working in certain areas.
[8] Under a government-sponsored programme called "Operation Beggar," street children in Bombay were rounded up and given into what was essentially indebted servitude.
[12] Street children in India are "a manifestation of societal malfunctioning and an economic and social order that does not take timely preventative action".
[4] Thus, many scholars believe that fixing the problems of street children depends on addressing the causal factors of their situations.
[4] In the early 1990s, facing pressure from non-governmental organisations (NGOs), the Indian government created the "Scheme for Assistance to Street Children," which launched in February 1993.
Bose of UNICEF and Sarah Thomas de Benitez of the Consortium for Street Children suggest that the main responsibility of assistance should be given to NGOs, which should be backed financially by the government.
These suggestions include the amendment of Sections 53 and 54 of the Code of Criminal Procedures to make a medical examination necessary when a street child is detained, ratifying the United Nations 1984 Convention Against Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and to amend the Juvenile Justice Act in order to create a mechanism for complaints and prosecutions for abuse.
