Inspiration
This Shantiniketan neighbour took 150 years to produce 4 Madhyamik passouts
Meteldanga, a village in Birbhum has produced 4 Madhyamik passouts after 150 years. The four who have entered in the pages of history are Khukumoni Tudu, 18, Sumi Maddi, 17, Saheb Maddi, 16, and Mangal Murmu, 16. Khukumoni scored 33 %, Sumi 31, Saheb 29 and Mangal 29 %.
At a time when the nation is roiling with controversies over the RTE admissions and how the teaching patterns need to change to consider learning outcomes instead of infrastructure, it is a news from a corner of India that at once warms the heart and yet sets a question mark on the situation begging to know what took so long to even get to this humble achievement.
Meteldanga is a village in Birbhum's Mayureswar Block I, its distinction is that it has taken 150 years to produce its first successful Madhyamik examinees. What’s ironic is that Meteldanga lies a mere 56km from the iconic Santiniketan where Tagore shaped his now world famous model of education. Anyways, the hamlet is rejoicing because 4 of its children have cleared the school-leaving exam including 2 girls.
The four who have entered in the pages of history are Khukumoni Tudu, 18, Sumi Maddi, 17, Saheb Maddi, 16, and Mangal Murmu, 16. Khukumoni scored 33 %, Sumi 31, Saheb 29 and Mangal 29 %.
Babulal Tudu, 70, a marginal farmer, proudly says that before these 4 no one from here went to high school. "There's a primary school in Ambha village, about 3km from here. Our children would go there and quickly start dropping out, some as early as Class I. Just a handful made it to Class IV."
Things began to change from 2001 when a local NGO, Mallarpur Naisuva opened a pre-primary school-cum-crèche in the village, which was expanded into a Shishu Shiksha Kendra with financial aid from the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan from 2002.
"The NGO people prodded us to let our children study at the Kendra and discouraged dropouts," Babulal said.
"All the 4 who have passed Madhyamik have studied at the Kendra. After completing Class IV there, they went on to study at two high schools – one for boys and the other for girls – in Mallarpur town, about 3km away."
"From around 2005, the dropout levels fell sharply because of the awareness spread by the NGO that ran the crèche," Khukumoni said.
The district administration plans to felicitate the 4 achievers. The villagers have even started collecting subscriptions to organise a cultural event in their honour.
"We'll soon felicitate them and assure them help with their future studies," Supriyo Das, sub divisional officer of Rampurhat.
Saheb, one of the four successful students, says: "We have told the NGO we want a college education and they have promised help." He added: "Our results haven't been as good as those of other students from our school but we'll try to improve our scores in the higher secondary exam."
Mallarpur Girls' High School is also thinking of feting Khukumoni and Sumi to encourage more girls students from Meteldanga to take up studies seriously, said its teacher-in-charge, Roji Ranjana Murmu.