Indian boy mirrors plight of millions of kids
New Delhi: Arun Kumar was born to disabled parents, beaten by his grandparents, ran away from home, got a job in a garment factory and had all his savings stolen by the police.
He was only 11.
Today, at 13, he shares a cramped, dingy shelter with 63 other runaways and former street kids in New Delhi. He is one of the lucky ones. Twenty years after the United Nations adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child, multitudes of children across the globe are still suffering from poverty, abuse and disease.
Children's Day just another working day for these kids
Each year, 4 million babies die before they are a month old, 150 million children are engaged in child labor, more than 500 million have been affected by violence and 51 million have fallen so far through the cracks they have not even had their births registered, according to the United Nations.
Image: A street child searches for recyclable material in a garbage dump on the outskirts of Gauhati on November 19, 2009, a day ahead of Universal Children's Day.
