India’s child actors lack sufficient legal protection

Of late, show business has been providing a lot of opportunities to young talent as a result of which there has been a sudden spurt in the growth of child actors both on television and in movies. These child actors start their careers at a very young age, sometimes too young to understand “showbiz” and the issues related to it. While there are established unions of producers, actors, junior artists and even supporting crew, which work towards the betterment and protection from exploitation of the respective community, no union of child actors exists.

India has no independent law for the protection of child actors or regulation of their work. As the chance that child actors may be exploited, overworked or swindled during their careers is usually high, special efforts should be made to provide child actors with safe working environments, ample time for education and a guarantee that their earnings will be protected.

The money game

California’s Coogan Law is named after child actor Jackie Coogan. His earnings, according to the law at the time, belonged to his parents. By the time he was 21, Coogan’s career was over and he sued his mother in an effort to claim some of his hard-earned money. As a result California revised and amended its law such that now money earned by minors working on entertainment projects belongs solely to the children as opposed to their parents, guardians or business representatives.

In India, while section 26 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000, makes withholding a child’s salary punishable, there is no strict protection for that salary at first hand. Although most big banner production houses comply with the law for the sake of their goodwill and pay child actors well, the “low budget” movie side is hidden.

Manisha Singh Nair and Pooja Dodd are partners at LexOrbis.