This is an account of my one day tryst with rural India. You may wonder, how could a single day visit compel me to write a blog on it? You are right, in a way. A lone, rare day in my life is not enough to describe the rural India. But I’m not even making an effort to write about our villages. My writing is about the way the visit has changed me. A paradigm shift in my choices as an educator.
I have been a doctor and educator for the past fifteen years of my life. The last ten years have seen me practicing as a child and academic counselor. Many times, international schools and reputed colleges have invited me as a speaker. Huge air-conditioned auditoriums, music and speeches talking of my achievements to welcome me, fancy chairs and podiums, and an equally fancy audience of fair, healthy children with pink cheeks were part of my lectures.
I would talk about making a global impact and revolutionary ideas to change the world. Post the session, delicious lunches or high tea would follow. I would then walk home with a fat pay cheque ready to be lapped by my greedy bank account. I worked. I earned. Ten years later, I am now saturated.
Over the years, I found my audience benefiting from my expertise, but there was nothing that I could look forward to apart from the money and fame. You would laugh off saying, ‘Isn’t money the biggest outcome of your work?’ No. Not at where I stand. Not that I have a palatial home and bank balance to boast of. Furthermore, I am not close to retirement and I have taken care of all my responsibilities. I have an eight-year-old who is trying to make a mark in the world of chess. His expenses are draining. Yet, I missed contentment.
As if there was a Santa listening to my silent wishes sent out in the universe, a friend called me to ask whether I was interested in doing a workshop for the NSS unit of a college in Padgha. I was initially reluctant, as Padgha is around 2 hours away from my home and notoriously known for certain anti-social elements. Hence, I requested the organizers for a pick and drop facility. To which the team of Rotary agreed wholeheartedly. The President of Rotary came to pick me.
On the way, he briefed me on various events of Rotary, their focus on youth empowerment, and the goal of seeing every child in rural India shine with the power of education. I was most of the time silent, out of a weird nervousness, of what awaited me. Will the children like someone from an urban, luxurious city coming and talking to them?
Who was I, the well-brought up, nursed in divine comforts individual, to speak on rural youth development? The irony hit me hard, and I kept mulling over the thought of stopping the fast speeding car and going back to my cocoon of sugar talks. I lacked the nerve to even step back. I chose to go with the flow.
As our car exited the highway and entered a dusty, narrow dirt track, I saw boards hung from trees that informed the visitors about the camp. The advertising, naïve and raw, amused me. A minuscule attempt as compared to the massive neon illuminated boards of the city with a la Anushka Sharma or Virat Kohli endorsing a fancy product.
The boards mocked my arrival. I was ashamed of myself. Why was it so late that I had chosen to do such an activity in the 36 years of my life? Better late than never, philosophy pumped some energy in my limbs, and I got out of the car. A two-storey building that seemed to be the municipal school or better called as the Gram Panchayat school welcomed me. Some of the participants were assembled on the playground that was supposed to be my open-air auditorium for the day, while a few others were washing utensils at a nearby tap.
The students had just finished eating their lunch prepared by self on chulas made from firewood. Later, their teacher told me these children were efficient in coating the bottoms of the vessels with ash so that the angry fire didn’t burn the bottoms and use the ash from the burned firewood to wash utensils. Nothing went into the bin. Sustainability at its best!
In the next 10 minutes, the teacher called out to the students, and the group gave us a NSS way salutation. Children whose skins were blessed by the Sun God, children whose muscular frame was taut from drawing water from the well or ploughing the field, children whose hands were calloused from hard labor, stood with smiles in front of me.
Dubiety gripped me. Who was going to learn life lessons- me or them? Before I could assimilate this question, one student briefly introduced me, and thus began our interaction.
What went on during the session wasn’t new to me. The regular talk on self-discovery and various areas of emotional management. The talk that changed my outlook was the one given by the students. Many of the students expressed their desire to become flight attendants, models, actresses, and such glamorous professions. But as their parents had turned down their aspirations, these children had opted for regular arts and commerce courses.
There was disappointment, but none of them had lost faith in their destiny. If not now, someday, we will achieve what we have aimed for. Their zeal to achieve the highest goal bore no fear, shame, or inferiority complex of coming from a lower socio-economic class.
To overcome financial barriers, few of the students had already started out as make-up artist and bakers. Mind you, we are talking about children living in huts without electricity, regular water supply, fields infested with snakes, and possibly missing a parent. Moments of despair were more than triumphs of victory. Yet, each individual present had decided to swim against the tide and fly against the current.
My learning in a nutshell:
- There is a fresh beginning to every end.
- Knowledge doesn’t need a formal classroom to come alive. It flows freely in the direction where it is desired.
- Wildflowers, even if not fragrant, are beautiful and meaningful.
- Thirst is universal. How you quench it decides your success graph.
- Rural India is the real India.
JAI HIND.