BONDED LABOR IN ABROAD

Bonded labor is a person's pledge of their labor or services as repayment for a loan or other debt. The services required to repay the debt may be undefined, and the services duration may be undefined. Debt bondage can be passed on from generation to generation.
The issue of bonded labor may receive marginal attention globally, but bonded labor is the most extensive form of slavery in the world today.
There were approximately 18 to 20.5 million bonded laborers in the world at the end of 2011, almost 90% of whom were in South Asia. This means that approximately half of the slaves in the world are bonded laborers in South Asia, particularly in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and in America and Africa.

In America
In the Americas, peonage was extended to include criminal peonage, where prisoners sentenced to hard labor were 'farmed out' to private or governmental groups.
Peonage is a type of involuntary servitude of laborers (peons) having little control over their employment conditions. Peonage existed historically during the colonial period, especially in Latin America.
As the New Mexico laws supported peonage, the US Congress passed an anti-peonage law on March 2, 1867. The current version of this statute is codified at Chapter 21-I of 42 U.S.C. § 1994 and makes no specific mention of New Mexico.
In Africa
Africa has its own unique version of debt bondage. Afrocentric academics claim that this was a much milder form of debt bondage compared to that experienced elsewhere, since it would occur on a family or community basis where social ties existed between debtor and creditor.
Pawnship, or debt bondage slavery, involves the use of people as collateral to secure the repayment of debt. Pawnship was a common form of collateral in West Africa.
It involved the pledge of a person, or a member of that person's family, to service another person providing credit. Pawnship was related to, yet distinct from, slavery in most conceptualizations because the arrangement could include limited, specific terms of services to be provided and because kinship ties would protect the person from being sold into slavery.
From the early 1980s to the present, Africa's external debt burden has become increasingly onerous and unmanageable.
In Pakistan
Bonded labor, also known as debt bondage, is probably one of the least known forms of slavery today but responsible for enslaving millions of people around the world. A laborer becomes bonded when his or her labor is demanded in repayment for a loan. This advance is known as `peshgi’ in Pakistan.
Bonded labor is a form of slavery prevalent in Pakistan in various sectors of the economy, most notably agriculture but also brick kilns, carpet weaving, fisheries, mining and probably others. Geographically speaking, the most widespread bonded labor is found in the southern portions of Sindh Province and Punjab Province, nevertheless, anecdotal evidence suggests that bonded labor exists in all four provinces of Pakistan.
Unfortunately, there are currently no reliable statistics on the number of bonded laborers in Pakistan. The ILO estimates that there are over one million men, women and children employed as bonded laborers in brick kilns. The same study estimated that over 1.8 million sharecroppers (agricultural workers) are bonded to landlords in Pakistan.
In Bangladesh
Bonded labor might be illegal in Bangladesh, but tens of thousands of Bangladeshis are forced to work for little or no pay to pay off exorbitant loans, according to Anti-Slavery International. Although rare in urban Bangladesh, bonded labor is common in rural areas. Many bonded laborers work seven days a week and face physical abuse. In 1972, Bangladesh ratified both ILO Convention No. 29 (1930), the Forced Labor Convention and ILO Convention No. 105 (1957), the Abolition of Forced Labor Convention.
Forced labor has been present in Bangladesh for centuries. After the liberation of Bangladesh, it changed its form and has taken the new face of various 'contracts' associated with loans taken by poor farmers from the usurers.
In Nepal
The traditional system of bonded labor in Nepal is known as Kamaiya. The people affected are also called Kamaiya or Kamaiyas. The Kamaiya system existed in particular in western Nepal and affects especially the Tharu people and Dalits.
Increasing protests against the Kamaiya system, organized by the "Kamaiya movement", led to its abolition in 2000. On 17 July that year, the Government of Nepal announced the Kamaiya system be banned, all Kamaiyas be freed and their debts be cancelled. Although most Kamaiya families were freed, the system has persisted. Many Kamaiyas were evicted by their former landlords and released into poverty without any support. Others received land that was unproductive.

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