Shortly after Iqbal Masih was born in a small village in rural Pakistan, his father abandoned the family. Iqbal's mother struggled to support her children as a housecleaner, but could not.
When he was four years old, Iqbal was sold for $16 into bonded labour at a carpet factory. He worked 12 hours a day and was horribly undernourished and beaten by the foreman many times.
When Iqbal was nine years old, a local labour rights organization helped him escape the factory. He was given a place at a school for freed child labourers in Lahore where he'd be safe. Iqbal began telling other child labourers about the law in Pakistan that made bonded labour illegal-they had never heard about this law. When children started to follow Iqbal's example and escape the factories, the owners threatened Iqbal and his family. But he didn't back down. At age 12, he travelled to Sweden and the U.S. to speak out against child labour. When he returned to Pakistan in April, 1995, Iqbal was shot and killed.
Iqbal's story reflects the lives of over 200 million children around the world who have been forced to give up school, sports, play and sometimes even their families and homes to work under dangerous, harmful, and abusive conditions. After reading about Iqbal's life and death, Craig Kielburger started Free The Children to continue what Iqbal had started: children helping children be free to live better lives.(
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