Tirupur, June 28: Child labour? What child labour? A mountain out of a molehill, nothing else.

That’s the reaction among knitwear exporters in this dusty and once obscure Tamil Nadu town after UK apparel chain Primark fired three suppliers for allegedly using child labour.

Primark’s action followed a BBC report that claimed the suppliers used children to finish off embroidery and sequin work at home, but those in the trade in this T-shirt town are not panicking.

Industry insiders here say they have no child labour “ghosts in their machines” to fear and, if at all, children were found working, they must have been some “school-going kids” in Sri Lankan Tamil refugee camps “helping their parents”.

“First and foremost, the use of child labour documented in this instance has not taken place in Tirupur. The (sacked) sub-contractors appear to have given the embroidery work to some families in a camp for Sri Lankan Tamil refugees in Bhavanisagar, some 40km away, on humanitarian considerations to give them some employment,” said a spokesman for the Tirupur Exporters Association (TEA).

Others, including manufacturers, exporters, trade union leaders and labour officials, were near unanimous that it was a “clear case of making a mountain out of a molehill”.

The TEA spokesman said Tirupur’s ISO-certified hosiery units were periodically inspected on behalf of foreign buyers. “So there is no way they can employ child labour,” he added.

“This (media exposé) is not new. A similar problem was faced by a garment exporter in Bangladesh and it was badly hit,” said a top executive of an export house, which has been supplying T-shirts for the last 22 years to Switcher.

The Swiss brand is one of several like Nike, Adidas and Van-Heusen that Tirupur’s textile traders have been catering to.

“We have our own audit compliance and random checking of sub-units which work for us,” the executive said, but added that certain types of embroidery work — or “applique” fixing on finished garments — could “only be done with hand”.

“Such works are given to the cottage industry where such mistakes (children assisting parents) could occur,” he said.

A labour official said at times they did come across kids helping out in smaller units catering only to the domestic market. “But our intensive drive against child labour, particularly in the last five years, has ensured its abolition 99 per cent in Tirupur’s garment export units.”

“No exporter worth his salt will employ child labour for he knows that his foreign buyer will slap heavy penalties,” said Chandran, a middle-level garment exporter. “But sometimes, the incursion of kids as helpers in a sub-contracted unit may escape our eyes.”

In this instance, “they gave the sequin work to somewhere in a village outside Tirupur”, said another garment exporter, adding that Primark was not the end of the road.

“We suspect the hand of an NGO in this latest exposé,” fumed Left trade union leader Balamani, of the CPI’s labour wing Aituc.

Balamani’s anger seems justified. One might still find an odd boy working in a Tirupur hotel, but garment units greet you with the board “No child labour employed here”.