Child labour is a common phenomenon in our society. It is not only common, but also a painful reminder to every civilised. We all are, perhaps, aware of the root causes of child labour. For a developing country like Nepal, the phrase child labour has several meanings, i.e., cheap and easily available source of labour, the reflection of the existing acute poverty and the exploitative socio-economic relations. It paints a gloomy picture of a vicious circle, consisting of adult unemployment-poverty-child labour. It is also synonymous with the denial of childhood of the children of our working community.

We have made lots of promises to our poor children with matching slogans like 'Help the children, protect the children, they are our tomorrow,' 'For children don't say tomorrow, children can not wait...' and so on and so forth, but, in reality, most of our efforts at keeping the promises have, somehow, been no better than a mere lip service.

GEFONT, a mainstream umbrella Organisation of the workers covering various trades and industries, takes a vow of self-criticism on realising its responsibility in this regard. Since child labour cannot be stopped at once, GEFONT disagrees with both the extreme views- to be passive because it would take too long for child labour to disappear; or to declare a boycott of the child labour related third world export items for its abrupt elimination. Committed to its policy of progressive elimination of child labour from the country, GEFONT has found a common ground to work within the ILO's International Programme on the Elimination of Child labour (ILO/IPEC).

The study on child labour in tea estates of Nepal, has been carried out under the GEFONT-IPEC co-operation in thirty five tea estates of Nepal. The study which examines the extent and the socio-economic conditions of child labour, is also a part of the GEFONT national campaign- GEFONT by 2000. It is an outcome of hard labour on the part of the GEFONT Survey Team, and an answer to those "intellectuals" who were not convinced that a trade union organisation can also conduct such a study.

At this moment, while presenting the report, I should not forget the tireless dedication of my comrades of the Survey Team, Mr. Umesh C. Upadhyaya, Mr. Binod Shrestha, Mr. Rudra Gautam, Mr. Som Rai, Mr. Buddhi Acharya, Mr. Kiran Mali, Ms. Sujita Shakya, Mr. Uddav K.C, Mr. Om Koirala, Late Rup Chan Uraun, Mr. Narayan Singh Rajbansi and Mr. Rajiv Ghimire of whom I am proud and to whom I am thankful for undertaking such a challenging task. I would also like to express my sincere thanks to Ms. Elizabeth Woong, Ms. Archana Tamang, Mr. Y. Amatya and all the other well-wishers who contributed their valuable assistance.

Finally, my special thanks are due particularly to Mr. H. Ghosh and the ILO/IPEC family for financial assistance to undertake this study and to the National Steering Committee of IPEC for its support. My sincerest thanks also go to several of my friends as well as all the workers and management family of the tea estates and various dignitaries of the society who shared their valuable experience during the Focused Group Discussions.

Bishnu Rimal
Secretary General
GEFONT
1 February 1997