Kailash Satyarthi Quotes

Kailash Satyarthi is an Indian children's rights activist. He is a Nobel Peace Prize recipient and founder of Bachpan Bachao Andolan , the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation, Global March Against Child Labour, and GoodWeave International.

To date, Kailash Satyarthi and his team at Bachpan Bachao Andolan have liberated more than 87,000 children in India from child labour, slavery and trafficking. In 1998, Satyarthi conceived and led the Global March against Child Labour, an 80,000 km-long march across 103 countries to put forth a global demand against child labour. The movement became one of the largest social movements ever on behalf of exploited children. The demands of the marchers, which included children and youth, were reflected in the draft of the ILO Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labour. The following year, the Convention was unanimously adopted at the ILO Conference in Geneva.

Kailash Satyarthi has been a member of a UNESCO body established with the goal of providing “Education for All” and has been on the board of the Fast Track Initiative . Satyarthi serves on the board and committee of several international organisations including the Center for Victims of Torture , the International Labor Rights Fund , and the International Cocoa Foundation.

Satyarthi was among Fortune magazine’s ‘World’s Greatest Leaders’ in 2015 and featured in LinkedIn’s Power Profiles List in 2017 & 2018. His work has been recognized through various national and international honours and awards including the Nobel Peace Prize of 2014, which he shared with Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan.

More recently, Satyarthi led a nationwide march, Bharat Yatra, in India covering 19,000 km in 35 days, to spread awareness about child sexual abuse and trafficking.

✵ 11. January 1954
Kailash Satyarthi photo
Kailash Satyarthi: 18   quotes 14   likes

Famous Kailash Satyarthi Quotes

“I was personally concerned and involved in child rights-related activities right from my childhood.”

Statement of 2011, as quoted in "Q&A: Kailash Satyarthi Winner of Nobel Peace Prize 2014" in The Wall Street Journal (10 October 2014) http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2014/10/10/qa-kailash-satyarthi-winner-of-nobel-peace-prize-2014/
Context: I was personally concerned and involved in child rights-related activities right from my childhood. Then over a period of time I realized that it is not possible that one person can make substantial change; so it is necessary to build an organization of like minded people and sensitize other people to join. I knew right from the beginning that child labor is not just a technical or legal issue and also not merely an economic issue. It’s a combination of several things. It’s a deep-rooted social evil and to wipe it out we have to build a strong movement. Bachpan Bachao Andolan has never been a typical NGO but it has emerged as a movement over a period of time.

“People often relate childish behaviour to stupidity or foolishness. This needs to change. I want to level the playing field where I can learn from children. I can learn transparency from children. They're innocent and straightforward.”

Times of India interview (2014)
Context: I'm a friend of the children. No one should see them as pitiable subjects. People often relate childish behaviour to stupidity or foolishness. This needs to change. I want to level the playing field where I can learn from children. I can learn transparency from children. They're innocent and straightforward.

“You have given the great honour … to hundreds of millions of children in the world who are deprived of their childhood and health and education, and fundamental right to freedom. It is a great moment for all those children.”

Interview with Nobel Media (2014)
Context: You have given the great honour … to hundreds of millions of children in the world who are deprived of their childhood and health and education, and fundamental right to freedom. It is a great moment for all those children. … I am quite hopeful and rather sure that this will help in giving bigger visibility and attention to the cause of children who are most neglected and most deprived. This will also inspire individuals, activists, governments, business houses, corporate to work hand in hand to fight this out. And I am quite hopeful about it, that the recognition of this issue will help in mobilising bigger support for the cause.

“I hope that youngsters and civil society organizations and every Indian will feel proud. It is a noble cause to work for the rights of children.”

Times of India interview (2014)
Context: I hope that youngsters and civil society organizations and every Indian will feel proud. It is a noble cause to work for the rights of children. It is a movement against child labour and everyone must join it.

“First of all, everyone must acknowledge and feel that child slavery still exists in the world, in its ugliest face and form.”

Interview with Nobel Media (2014)
Context: First of all, everyone must acknowledge and feel that child slavery still exists in the world, in its ugliest face and form. And this is an evil, which is crime against humanity, which is intolerable, which is unacceptable and which must go. That sense of recognition must be developed first of all. And secondly there is a need of higher amounts of political will. There is a need of higher amount of corporate engagement, and the engagement of the public towards it. So, everybody has a responsibility to save and protect the children on this planet.

Kailash Satyarthi Quotes about children

“Poverty must not be used as an excuse to continue child labor and exploitation of children”

As quoted in "Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi Are Awarded Nobel Peace Prize" by Alan Cowell and Declan Walsh, in The New York Times (10 October 2014) http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/11/world/europe/kailash-satyarthi-and-malala-yousafzai-are-awarded-nobel-peace-prize.html?_r=0
Context: Poverty must not be used as an excuse to continue child labor and exploitation of children … It’s a triangular relationship between child labor, poverty and illiteracy, and I have been trying to fight all of these things together.

Kailash Satyarthi Quotes

“We work against a social evil. If this evil isn't reacting it means we aren't a threat.”

Times of India interview (2014)
Context: We work with broken families and broken people who've lost hope and are helpless. If people oppose my work, launch personal attacks, we know that we are on the right path. One colleague was shot, another was beaten to death. I've injuries all over my body. We work against a social evil. If this evil isn't reacting it means we aren't a threat.

“If I was not fighting against child labor, I don't know what else I could do. It was always in my heart, I could not live without that”

As quoted in "Person of the Week: Kailash Satyarthi" by Peter Jennings, at ABC News (14 May 2004) http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/PersonOfWeek/story?id=131826&page=1
Context: If I was not fighting against child labor, I don't know what else I could do. It was always in my heart, I could not live without that … It's really a kind of spiritual feeling which is difficult to explain … And the smiles come on the face of the children when they realize that they are free. … When you are living in a globalized economy and a globalized world, you cannot live in isolation, all the problems and solutions are interconnected, and so the problem of child labor in any part of the world is your problem. … The world should have one thing in mind — if the children are exploited in any part of the world, if the children are deprived of their childhood in any part of the world, the world cannot live in peace … The world cannot be human.

“We work with broken families and broken people who've lost hope and are helpless.”

Times of India interview (2014)
Context: We work with broken families and broken people who've lost hope and are helpless. If people oppose my work, launch personal attacks, we know that we are on the right path. One colleague was shot, another was beaten to death. I've injuries all over my body. We work against a social evil. If this evil isn't reacting it means we aren't a threat.

“We are going to organise End Child Slavery Week from 19th November to 25th November, and that would be an annual event”

Interview with Nobel Media (2014)
Context: We are going to organise End Child Slavery Week from 19th November to 25th November, and that would be an annual event which we would be organising every year on different aspects of child slavery, and this year we are demanding to the international community that the abolition of child slavery must be incorporated into the post-millennium development goal or the sustainable development goal. So that would be the emphasis of this year's End Child Slavery Week.

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