25. PROTECTION AGAINST ALL FORMS OF VIOLENCE The BNHRC appreciates that the Children Act 2013 provides that if any person having custody of any child is proved guilty of assault, abuse, neglect, desertion or making a child work for his personal purpose, or exposes the child in an indecent way and thereby causes unnecessary suffering or injury which impairs the child’s sight or hearing or inflicts injury to any limbs or organs or causes mental injury, will be punished with imprisonment up to five years or fine or both.18 In addition, exploitation of a child by a person entrusted with the care of a child under an order of the Children’s Court or by a person who obtains custody of the child by promising to employ him in a factory or any other institutions has been made punishable with two years’ imprisonment.19 26. The BNHRC is conscious that the recent Demographic and Health Survey found that in Bangladesh girl-children who married before age 18 were more likely than those who married later to be subjected to physical violence by their partners. The incidence of violence by partner was particularly high (47 per cent). More than 1 in 10 adolescent girls surveyed in Bangladesh reported partner sexual violence. About one in five ever-partnered girls aged between 15-19 reported violence by partners.20 The BNHRC also notes with concern that working children, particularly those employed in ‘hidden jobs’ such as domestic labour, were at risk of abuse and exploitation. According to a 2008 children’s opinion poll, one-quarter of all working children reported that they had been physically punished at their workplaces.21 Child domestic workers were highly vulnerable to abuse. Bangladesh’s 421,000 child domestic workers (of whom roughly three-quarters are girls) faced particular vulnerabilities because they worked behind closed doors. A qualitative study of 80 child domestic workers in Dhaka found that half of the girls and one-third of the boys considered themselves to have been physically abused by their employers.22 27. The BNHRC appreciates that the Supreme Court in BNWLA vs. Bangladesh17 MLR 2012 (HCD) 109 issued the following ten directives to address the plight of child domestic workers:23- (1) taking immediate steps to prohibit all forms of employment of children (including domestic works) up to the age of 12 years; (2) obliging employers of child domestic workers to provide for the training/employment of the child domestic workers aged between 13 to 18 years; (3) implementing the National Child Labour Elimination Policy 2010, and particularly recommended setting up of a focal Ministry/focal point, Child Labour Unit and National Child Labour Welfare Council for its implementation; (4) taking measures for inclusion of child domestic workers within the 18 Supra 15, Section 70. Ibid, Section 80(1). 20 UNICEF, Hidden In Plain Sight, September 2014, pp. 131-139. 20 UNICEF, Child Labour in Bangladesh, Bangladesh Country Office, p. 3. 21 UNICEF, Situation Assessment and Analysis of Children and Women in Bangladesh, Bangladesh 22 Country Office, September 2009, p. 127. 23Dr. Md. Rizwanul Islam, Study Report on Regulating the Unregulated Domestic Works by hildren; June 2014, p. 13. 19 13