ANDHRA PRADESH

A school, on the river

The fisherman Donullu community, relegated to the river by the upper classes, wouldn’t step on land. Now, with children riding the SSA boat everyday, the horizons are getting wider

“Congenital illiterates”. That’s what officials in the Andhra Pradesh education department called the Donullu people in Uppalaki Mondi. And not without reason. The Donullus are the “lowest” of the fisherman class in the East Godavari district of the state and are prohibitied by the “upper” classes to live on land. So a typical Donullu spends his or her entire life on a little fishing boat called a “doni”, from where the tribe gets its name. At most, they step on dry land once every two weeks to trade.

For centuries, no Donullu has had an education, let alone formal schooling. Every member of the tribe catches small fish or gathers shells which are sold for their calcium carbonate content. Around 300 families in this little waterway, off Kakinada, have known of no other way of life.

The education department had its own unlearning to do before it could get to providing the stipulated basic education. When the Donullus refused to come to school, officials decided the school would go to them.

Now, every morning, around nine, as the boatmen begin rowing out toward the high seas, the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan boat follows them. It goes from boat to boat, collecting the children. Then, hemming along the inland waterways, the boat drifts all morning as classes go on. Upto 12 pm, instructors, youth chosen from neighbouring communities, teach children the basic Telugu alphabet and tell them about life on the banks of the river. Sometimes, they dance to FM music from an old radio running on a motorcycle-battery.

At noon, the children are given a meal from the government’s mid-day meal scheme. From 1pm to 4pm, the boat floats around the inland water canals until the lessons for the day are over. The number of children on the boat varies. The same children don’t appear everyday. Some days, they stay back to help their parents fish or they’re unwell and can’t make it. But all in all, officials say, the community is now serious about sending the children to school.

And for DN Murthy, project coordinator for the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan in East Godavari, that is half the battle won. “When we first approached them, they refused to talk to us. They would not let us get on their boats. They said the children didn’t need school,” he recalls. But the government officials stuck at it. “We went there everyday, trying to convince them. We held meetings with them. We called local leaders, politicians, even the collector to try and explain to them.”

Eventually, it was some good, old-fashioned bribery that worked. Murthy Raju, an assistant programme officer, says, “We started giving the parents things like water, small household items, on the condition that they would come discuss this with us, that their children would be sent to the school.” Finally, a few agreed.

In 2004, the department bought a small, used boat for Rs 20,000 and painted it in bright colours, with alphabets, small words, numbers and pictures running along the sides. Besides textbooks and slates, officials put together toys and other curiosities. “A lot of the children come here just to play,” says 26-year-old Veera Bhou, one of the two instructors on the boat. But even that is encouraging enough.

The other teacher, 23-year-old Veeranna, like Bhou, gets an “honorarium” of Rs 1,500 a month. And while it is a “school on boat”, officials see it as an orientation programme — the idea is to get the children to formal schools.

“After about three months on the boat, children are taken to RBCs, or Residential Bridge Schools,” says Murty Raju. Here, the Donullu children meet children from outside for the first time. After living and studying here for about six months, they are finally taken to formal, state government schools, to be “main-streamised”.

The first time officials wanted to send children to an RBC, it was almost impossible. “The close-knit community is wary of sending their children away to study. In the beginning, they just didn’t trust us. That’s part of the reason we can’t send them to a formal school directly,” says Murthy. Since 2004, 82 children have been sent to formal, residential schools, where everything is paid for. And 55 among them were girls.

Eyes pitch-black with kajal, nine-year-old Durga volunteers, “I learnt the alphabet and yesterday I learnt how to dance. I want to be a teacher and teach others everything I will learn.” And when she grows up, she wants to live on a farm, something her family hasn’t heard of.

Sandagi Manikanta, 11, on the other hand, wants to operate machines. Unlike many of his classmates, he doesn’t want to become a doctor and he wants to build a house by the side of the water. His teachers say the boy is sharp and will adjust well in a formal school.

“We all want the children to study but if the school is nearer, we are happier to send them,” says Sangaddi Easwaramma, packing off her little ones to school. A small hut made by the side of the waterway for children to play in was washed away by a recent storm. The government is now planning to build a concrete hut.

But for the Donullu community, the school on boat has done more than just put a few children in school. It has shown the children — and their parents — that a life beyond the canals is possible. “Even the little education we have given them has helped the community. Now they don’t sell fish through the middleman who paid them Rs 30 for a kilo of fish that sells for Rs 140 in the market,” says Murthy.

Officials say the parents still demand “favours” for sending their kids to school, but it’s not a bad bargain still. There are already thinking of the next difficulty they have to surmount – alcohol addiction that unless checked will tip the benefits reaped so far.

—KARN KOWSHIK

All children in school, Education Guarantee Centre, Alternate School, ‘ Back-to-School’ camp by 2003

All children complete five years of primary schooling by 2007

All children complete eight years of elementary schooling by 2010

Bridge all gender and social category gaps at primary stage by 2007 and at elementary education level by 2010

Universal retention by 2010

Meena Manch girls have stopped child marriages, helped in Polio programmme, brought more children to school, spread awareness about hygienic practices…

In 2000, Meena was an idea. A symbol of the girl child developed by the UNICEF, it was adopted by the state to launch an education and awareness campaign at the grassroots level in select districts through girl clubs called Meena Manch.

Today, Meena is each of those four lakh girls who have changed lives for themselves and others all across the state. Between 11-18 years, they belong to the state’s 19,705-strong Meena Manch network.

In the outskirts of Lucknow, Kumari Meena shares her name with the movement. A class VIII student, she learnt cycling a year back at her school. Being the in-charge of the Meena Manch in her School, she has since trained over 80 girls studying with her.

“Earlier, my mother had to wait for my father to bring things from the marker but now I do most of the job for her,” says Priyanka, a class VII student.

In Kanpur district, a group of these girls in Rania village united against eve-teasers. In Muzaffarnagar, a group of girls was successful in stopping two child marriages. In Bahraich, another group brought 1000 students to school. In Sravasti, the girls convinced students of primary schools to wash their hands before eating. In various districts, the girls maintain libraries with books given to them under girls education programmes.

In 2005, the programme spread all over the state and all the Government Junior High Schools were roped in. In last four months, these clubs have been successful in bringing over 30,000 children back to school.

Even the education officers accept that their contribution has given new meaning to the SSA. “One has to see these clubs to believe how effective they are,” says Mukesh Singh, basic Education officer, Lucknow, “It’s a silent revolution.”

—MAULSHREE SETH

Every day, as the big yellow bus that functions as a mobile classroom rolls into a slum in Bangalore, there are two distinct reactions from children

One set of ragged children rush towards the bus, screaming and shouting, dragging along plastic bags containing books. Another group of children run away from the bus, ducking and dodging into their shanty homes.

While classes begin for the eager bunch, the second set are dragged out of their homes by the bus driver, teachers and an ayah.

Mobile classrooms have been one of the key initiatives in Karnataka under the SSA for reaching some sort of education to children from poor families. Appropriately, one of the key attractions on the bus is an afternoon meal cooked at the International Society for Krishna Consciousness ISKCON temple at Bangalore.

Eight government buses have been converted into mobile classrooms to fan out in the slums in Bangalore and gather children of the primary school age who have been left behind at home by their parents. Called Sanchari Shale, the classrooms are a sort of induction programme into mainstream education, says assistant director of public instruction and head of the mobile classroom programme, Markanayya.

After children spend a year in the mobile classroom, they are admitted into a formal government school nearby. Official figures show that 5,286 children have come aboard the mobile classroom; as many as 4,800 have been inducted into formal schools.

Teachers and officials involved with the programme, however, say their success rate is only about 50 per cent since attendance is very inconsistent and families tend to migrate very frequently. The beginning, however, has been made. “One of our basic lessons is to teach the children good hygiene. We have been most successful in this,” says Anil Kumar, a coordinator and assistant teacher in the programme.

—Johnson TA

A van playing movies drew children working in the brick kilns of Jhajjar to their mobile school, but education still has some way to go

When a mobile van first rolled into the interiors of Haryana’s Jhajjar district in February this year, there was much commotion. Instead of passenger seats, there were plastic chairs inside and a screen showing animated movies for children.

Initially, the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan’s concept of a mobile classroom for children working in brick kilns in the district seemed a little over-ambitious. The students in question here were children between six and 14 years from neighbouring states who had come to find work.

“We started off with conviction but we knew it was not going to be easy,” says additional district education officer Sushil Batra. “The kids we were targetting came from states like Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan for work in the brick kilns. It was difficult to wean them away from the kilns and get them started with numbers and alphabets.”

So, besides an instructor and driver, a helper was employed to be on the lookout for such children. Two routes were charted for the van, covering Bajidpur, Shekpur, Jhangipur, Pahasaur and Bad villages where the kilns were scattered.

Eventually, it was computers that got the children going. “We would show them films on topics that they had studied from textbooks. We also distributed pencils, notebooks and sometimes, food to ensure they stayed on,” says assistant project coordinator SSA Satyavrat. In five months, the mobile classroom covered 300 children from the kilns. “I guess our perseverance paid off. Children started coming in regularly and we ran the van on all days,” says Batra.

Then, as the kilns started closing down for the rainy season by mid-June, the classes started running empty. By the end of June, the mobile classroom wound up.

Officials say funds were never a problem though the issue of livelihood needs to be settled first. Batra is already gearing up for the next session: “May be, we can begin again in December when the brick kilns reopen.”

—Pallavi Singh

Children of migrant workers in north Kolkata are discovering a new world as they discover their new home

“Amra kothay aachchi where are we?” a teacher asks in singsong as Puja and her classmates run their fingers on a shining globe, desperately looking for Kolkata above the blue of the Bay of Bengal. It’s not a question their parents have asked since they left their homes to find work. For hundreds of children, living in the Muslim-dominated Rajabazar and adjoining localities, the world just got bigger, thanks to Sree Bidya Mandir, a north Kolkata school, running into its 40th year.

The school was taken up for development six months ago, under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, being implemented by CINI ASHA, the urban unit of Child In Need Institute, a city-based non-government organisation. In place of the dilapidated building is a revamped school.

Brightly painted desks and chairs fill the classrooms, the walls lined with illustrations and charts. And a cache of brand new globes, maps, drawing books, puzzles and textbooks is now laying the groundwork for the future of 200-odd students.

“We focus on creating the right ambience first,” says Bipasha Keshri, a programme associate. “Then, we work on the child tracking system to verify if students are attending classes regularly. All schools on our priority list were run in rented premises and required a facelift. It’s difficult to attract children in such conditions but things are happening now.”

Sree Bidya Mandir is among 100 schools roped in for the programme. “We are witnessing a fall in absentee-rate,” says Sipra Das, the head-mistress. Back at the classroom, the children are eager to chat. “My brother didn’t study much. My mother says I can become a nurse or a teacher only if I study. She doesn’t want me to work, as many children in my locality do,” says Puja, as she skips rope.

Leaps and bounds, they say.

—MOHAMMED SAFI SHAMSI

Free textbooks for all girls/SC/ST children at primary and upper primary level within an upper ceiling of Rs 150 per child

School within one kilometre of every habitation

4 to 5 hours per day of meaningful stay of each child in school

No single teacher school, At least two teachers in a Primary school and one teacher for every class in the upper primary

At least 1: 40 teacher-pupil ratio and at least 50 per cent women teachers