Plight of children in hazardous work

Recently I met a 12-year-old boy, Sumon, who works in a steel factory. His family lives in a slum at Shahid Nagar near Islambagh, Dhaka. His father is a fruit seller who earns very little. So Sumon was forced to leave school and started doing this labourious job. He earns 1800 taka per month after working 10-12 hours a day. His factory owner sometimes punishes him physically for not being able to perform heavy jobs.

There are thousands of working children in Bangladesh and Sumon is just one of them. While they are supposed to be at school at this tender age, poverty has driven them out of school and they have to do jobs not suitable for them. Can't we protect these kids from this miserable condition?

Sujon Weasly Biswas
Department of MBA
Jahangirnagar University