Part B (Q6): Highlight the issues and challenges of Children at risk.

"Children at risk" refers to minors who face circumstances that severely threaten their physical, psychological, or social development. In India, a vast number of children fall into this category due to socio-economic disparities.

Major Issues and Challenges

1. Child Labour and Exploitation: Millions of children in India are forced into hazardous labor (e.g., in brick kilns, carpet weaving, or domestic work) due to extreme family poverty. This robs them of their childhood, education, and health. Furthermore, child trafficking for forced begging or commercial sexual exploitation remains a massive, dark challenge.

2. Malnutrition and Stunting: India has one of the highest rates of child malnutrition in the world. Lack of maternal nutrition, poverty, and poor sanitation lead to severe stunting and wasting, permanently damaging cognitive and physical development.

3. Children in Conflict with the Law (Juvenile Delinquency): Children living in slums, broken homes, or on the streets are at high risk of turning to petty crime or substance abuse (like sniffing glue) to survive. The challenge lies in rehabilitating them rather than treating them as hardened adult criminals.

4. Street Children and Runaways: Children who live on the streets (often fleeing domestic violence or extreme poverty) are highly vulnerable to physical and sexual abuse, police harassment, and extreme weather. They lack identity documents, making it difficult to access state welfare.

5. Abuse and Violence: Many children are at risk within their own homes or schools. Physical abuse, corporal punishment, and child sexual abuse (often by known relatives or acquaintances) cause deep, lasting psychological trauma.

6. Educational Deprivation: Despite the Right to Education Act, millions of children (especially girls and those from marginalized castes/tribes) drop out of school due to lack of infrastructure, poverty, or the requirement to care for younger siblings.

The Challenge: The primary challenge in addressing these issues is the lack of strict enforcement of existing child protection laws, massive underfunding of child welfare institutions (like the Juvenile Justice Boards and Child Welfare Committees), and the deep-rooted poverty that forces families to view children as economic assets rather than individuals with rights.