| Published on 28-07-2007 In National |
| Viewed 1472 times |
| India's fairytale - marginalized move to mainstream professions |
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Written by
Sarwar Kashani |
They are the children of labourers, farmers, waiters and watchmen. Many are from the much discriminated against Dalit community. But, in a remarkable coming of age story of modern day India, hundreds of men and women have beaten back centuries of odds like caste and poverty to make it to the country's most privileged professions this year.
These youths who have qualified for, say, the elite Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) or the civil services hail not from the metros but from far-flung economically backward areas.
This year the topper in the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), which forms the core of India's bureaucracy, is Muthyala Raju Revu who lives in a village that doesn't even have basic roads and communication lines. The farmer's son from an island hamlet in southern Andhra Pradesh always wanted to top one of the most sought after professions -- the civil services.
And he did, never letting his financial hardships or caste division - he belongs to the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) - come in the way of his dreams.
"I am from a coastal village which lacks basic facilities like transport, education and health services," he said about his humble background.
Revu had cleared the IAS earlier too but the desire to top led him to write the exam a third time. He secured the 223rd rank in the second attempt in 2006 and joined as an IPS (Indian Police Service) probationer.
And now he says: "There is nothing a man can't achieve. You have to believe in yourself, be positive and prepare to achieve the goal."
Bishnu Charana Mallick's story is quite similar. A resident of Thalakodi village in eastern Orissa, Mallick secured the 11th position in the civil services.
But look at the odds stacked against him: he is the son of a Dalit labourer who became landless after selling off his five-acre agricultural plot to maintain the family and finance the education of the children.
Throughout his formative years, Mallick burnt the proverbial midnight oil while living in a thatched house. But, he said: "Poverty cannot be a hurdle in the face of determination and hard work, so everyone should pursue his or her dream."
Then there is the case of Vinod Bahade, the son of a retired labourer from Maharashtra, who cleared his civil services exams this year. His childhood and early youth was spent in a palm-roofed house.
"As I poured over my books in dim lantern light every night, my father would say he would do anything to see me become a doctor or an engineer. I wondered where he was going to bring the money for my education from," said Bahade, who also completed his MBBS before securing a place in the civil services.
Bahade's father, who was a labourer in BILT (Ballarpur Industries Ltd), sought voluntary superannuation and reserved his retirement benefits for the education of his son. And the results are for all to see.
Social scientists relate the trend to increasing awareness about highly rated professions in India.
Dipankar Gupta, a sociologist at the national capital's Jawaharlal Nehru University, explained: "People from the less privileged classes are getting mindful of the top jobs even as students from the so-called high classes at the same time are losing interest in the civil services.
"Bureaucratic jobs have also lost their sheen because they no longer carry a good image. People from urban classes are opting for private jobs, which are more lucrative than government jobs."
Now meet Mani Bhusan Singh, the son of a waiter from Bihar capital Patna. The 18-year-old, who lives in a one-room, rented house with his parents in the Mandiri area, made it to the prestigious IIT this year.
There was a time when he had wanted to appear for the Class 10 and 12 exams organised by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) exams but couldn't for lack of money.
"My son wanted to take the CBSE exams but due to lack of money I forced him to appear for the Bihar board exams," said Lallan Singh, his proud father.
Like Bhusan, 15 other students from underprivileged families in Patna made it to the IITs this year after being guided by a group of former IITians - I-Desire, which provides free coaching and counselling to aspiring candidates from the weaker sections of society.
Super 30, another such institute, is located inside a small thatched house with fraying wooden benches and creaking tables in a densely populated lower middle class locality in the east Indian city of Patna.
With 28 of its 30 students making it to the IITs, it has brought hope to at least a dozen poor families from across Bihar where nearly half of the 83 million population cannot read or write and nearly 50 percent lives below the poverty line.
"We started Super 30 with a clear cut mission to provide the poor and under-privileged an opportunity to excel in education," said Anand Kumar, who has not forgotten how he could not cough up the money needed to finance his own higher education when he received admission to Cambridge University in the 1990s.
Super 30 is supported by income generated from a mathematics school run by Anand that has students from affluent families who can afford to pay up.
The average private institute that trains students for the IIT joint entrance exam demand upwards of $1,000. And this doesn't include the cost of study material.
But not so with Super 30. Most of the successful 28 are not from any elite English schools, but from Hindi medium institutions or little-known English medium ones.
Among its successful students is Pranav Prince whose father is unemployed and whose mother ekes out a living by tailoring clothes. Similarly, there's Abhisek Anand whose father is a watchman, Ashok Kumar whose father is a salesman in a garments showroom and Shayam Ratan whose widowed mother is a nurse.
Even as India is divided over 27 percent quotas for OBCs in higher educational institutions, this year's successes have shown that students from underprivileged backgrounds can make it given half a chance.
It's when age-old divides melt away in the face of dogged determination. |
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