Government is spending crores of rupees to ensure better education facility to those children who are residing in tribal areas, generally away from even basic necessities of their life, under Right to Education Act.
Unending questions may be raised on the rationale behind and obviously on the outcome but not on the Ekal Vidyalaya. The ‘single teacher school’ has made its presence felt in and presented a ray of hope for the children of deprived section of the society.
Devanand Bhogta of Zangi village at Gola district teaches in the Ekal Vidyalaya. “I am working in this foundation for last one year. It is a wonderful experience as a lone teacher we have to teach seven subjects which are literature, mathematics, general knowledge and science awareness , sports education, handicraft, moral education, and society and nationality education,” says Bhogta.
The management to overcome the limitation has divided these seven subjects for seven days. One subject is taught in three hours class. Besides including classes of fun learning with songs and poets they also give a feel of entrepreneurship by developing self employment skills. The Foundation is running 48,000 such single teacher schools successfully all over the country.
Aim of the school is to make the educationally marginalised children of villages literate by adopting fun besides training the children to generate employment within their own village rather than moving out to the cities in search of their livelihood.
Women of the tribal villages are taught to grow organic turmeric and other spices then these products are sold out in their nearby city market and in this way they are also contributing in their family earning with the help of Ekal Vidyalaya.
Gopi Chak, student of Ekal vidyalaya said, “In 2004 when I was in my matriculation my mother expired which adversely affected our financial situation. She was the only working member in the family. My study was getting affected due to this and I was not able to continue my studies. Then I came to know about Ekal Vidyalaya and it became a turning point of my life. It helped me in my studies and also taught me to make vermi composed through which I started earning my livelihood. At present, I earn about Rs 1.5 lakh per annum,” said Gopi.
lalan Sharma, central in charge of Jharkhand and Bihar said, “Earlier the basic aim of Single teacher school was to educate the children of tribal village but gradually we learned that not only education but self employment is also a major problem faced by the village people. So for last ten years we started working on this problem also and we are excelling into it”.