Police on Wednesday rescued nearly 200 children, most under 14 years of age from a brick kiln in Telangana in one of its biggest operations in region, officials said.

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The operation which was a part of Operation Smile, a national campaign to tackle child r=labour and missing children was carried out by police in Yadadiri district, 40 kms away from the state capital Hyderabad. The rescued children had moved from Odisha and were living and working with adults presumed to be their parents in the brick kiln, police said.

"We are not sure if the parents are genuine and there is a possibility that some of the children were trafficked," Mahesh Bhagwat, a police commissioner was quoted by Reuters.

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"The rescue teams spotted girls as young as seven and eight carrying bricks on their head. Some of the children were as young as four." According to Internaitional Labour Organisation statistics 2015, there are 5.7 million Indian child workers aged between five and seventeen out of the global figure of 168 million.More than half work in agriculture and over a quarter work in the manufacturing sector, the ILO said.

P. Achyuta Rao, member of a local state body that has the task of protecting child rights, said Telangana and neighbouring Andhra Pradesh had become hubs for child trafficking and child labour.

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"Last year more than 3,000 children were rescued, many from brick kilns and others from domestic servitude. In all cases, the children were from eastern India," said Rao of the Telangana State Commission.