London, March 30: Children of plantation workers in Sri Lanka are being sold into slavery for less than $5 each, the Sunday Times reported to-day.
The Sunday Times reporter, Mr. Anthony Mascarenhas, told how he purchased an eight-year-old boy in Colombo last month for Rs. 40.
He said the boy, Raju, was one of hundreds of children being sold into slavery by their hungry parents, Tamil workers on the tea and rubber plantations of Sri Lanka.
“It is the easiest thing in the world to buy a slave child,” the reporter wrote.
The child was brought by a broker who identified himself as the boy’s uncle, the report said.
Raju’s mother, when asked why she was selling her child, was reported to have said: “Dry season. Very little work. No food for many days. Now we buy some.”
“All that was demanded of me was that I should feed and clothe him,” the reporter said.
Mr. Mascarenhas said he paid Rs. 40 plus another Rs. 60 for good measure, and then gave back to the woman her son.
The report said the Tamil labourers recruited from India by British planters were stateless, non-voting outsiders in Sri Lanka. They are the nation’s lowest-paid workers, averaging about $17 (Rs. 126) per family per month.
The press and parliament in Sri Lanka have also discussed the child slavery affairs recently and the Colombo Juvenile Court had traced some of the children and tried to return them to their parents, the newspaper added.
Published – March 31, 2025 12:15 am IST