GSISCHILD LABOUR AWARENESS DRIVE

On the 1^st of December 2016 (that is the World Aids Day), the middle school students of Good Shepherd International School drove to the Ooty town in order to spread awareness about child labour among the people who reside there. The sole purpose was met by the distribution of pamphlets which contained information regarding child labour in India along with its negative effects there were pictures to accompany them. The information was printed on both sides. On one side in English and the other side was printed in Tamil so that not only the English speaking population learned about this harmful yet sensitive topic but also the natives who were not familiar with English. We made a round trip as we started from the Ooty bus stand and back. We round trip passed through the Municipal market, Chairing cross and the Community hall along with the bus stand. We carried a banner for this campaign as well, which was stuck on we bus. To our surprise, many of the people who seemed to be in a real hurry stopped to receive the pamphlets even if we couldn’t actually stay and listen to what it was all about. Many people who were going about their daily lives were ready to listen to the students as we briefed what the entire drive was all about. A large number of taxi drivers were really interested to know about our campaign and it really could be read by our expressions how they actually understood the importance of this topic. All of us had really enjoyed the drive as each and every one of us had been put in a small team which was done on random with teachers and every one of us got to give out pamphlets as all the teams went in a different direction and came back together. The campaign not only divulged information to the students about child labour but also gave them a firsthand experience of distributing pamphlets on the streets which were packed with tourists and people going about their daily lives. We even learned about the different mindsets of the people as some were supporting child labour as they might have not identified it as anything negative. We, as we started had it in our minds that many people would surely be aware of this topic but to our surprise many were not aware of this topic as such and even that they were not taking it as anything negative as the child had agreed to do so but, the most important factor is that even if it is not forced, at the end of the day it is something which needs to be eradicated and taken care of.