an umbrella for matters relating to children in general but it may be expected that the
problems relevant to child domestic workers would also fit within its jurisdiction.
A major concern with the policy instruments for the protection of children crafted
by the Government in Bangladesh is that they rarely impose any specific obligations on
any of the bodies formed under them. Thus, it is no surprise that they would rarely
succeed in achieving tangible outcomes or perhaps more possibly pointing to some bits
and pieces of those instruments, policy makers would be able to argue that they have
yielded positive developments and on the other hand, pointing to other parts of them,
their detractors would argue that the instruments have failed to bring about any positive
outcome. In such state of affairs, a legitimate question would arise as to whether the
public money spent on formulating these policies could have been better spent on policies
with concrete obligations imposed on public bodies.
Even when they may impose obligations on public officials, the policy
instruments do not include any cost based analysis on the budgetary allocation required
for their successful implementation. Thus, the implementation of the policies may also
often be hindered by the lack of specific budgetary allocation for taking the steps
necessary for implementing them. It is true that the National Plan of Action for
Implementing the National Child Labour Elimination Policy 2012-2016 contains a
detailed budget82 but it appears that the fund allocated for various actions are inadequate
to meet the objectives and fund has not been allocated in alignment with the all the
objectives mentioned in the policies. In particular, from the view point of this study
report, it is problematic that no specific fund is allocated for child domestic work issues
except for the allocation for developing a Code of Conduct for Domestic workers which
is aimed at prevention, protection, and elimination of child domestic works.83
82
83
National Plan of Action, above note 3, Appendix 2.
Ibid, at page 35.
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