Where there is will, there is a way! A tribal girl from Ranchi has made this adage a reality. Meet Sheetal Kumari, who fought all odds to secure 114 All India Rank in prestigious Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) and booked a berth in the same college where her father works as a security guard.
A resident of Patra Toli under Kanke area of the State Capital, Sheetal is now a student of National University of Study and Research in Law (NUSRL), where her father Jitan Ram Tirkey spends the entire day guarding the main gate.
She completed her schooling from Cambrian Public School, Ranchi in 2017 with excellent performance and got 8.5 Cumulative Grade Point Average. She completed her Intermediate from Ursuline Intermediate College, Ranchi with 66 per cent marks and her subjects were other than Hindi, English she choose History, Economics and Sociology.
“I want to study Law as I belong to tribal community and very few people have studied Law in this community, so I will make them aware about Law and their basic rights,” said Sheetal.
As her father was working at NUSRL, he talked to students and enquired about admission process in the university. The students informed her that one becomes eligible for entrance examination after passing intermediate.
Sheetal started her preparation for CLAT just after passing her matriculation examination. She contacted some students of NUSRL and the students started helping her by giving tips about the questions of the entrance examination. Then she came to know about an institution called Increasing Diversity by Increasing Access (IDIA) formed by top legal professionals of across the country to sponsor legal education especially for underprivileged and marginalized people across the country. Afsar Raza is the State coordinator of IDIA in Ranchi and students of NUSRL.
“I started going to NUSRL every Sunday as Raza sir with other students of the university started giving tips about the examination on the day. Just before their examination in the month of March they referred me to join National CLAT Academy Kanke Road, Ranchi runs for preparation of the entrance examination. I have joined the classes which helps me immensely to crack the examination. The classes were free of cost as they given me chance after scanning my ability,” said Sheetal.
National CLAT Academy, Director, Kamendra Kumar who also passed out from NUSRL said that they tested Sheetal’s ability then gave her a chance to join the academy as she showed her talent in the test. She easily cracked the entrance examination after getting some tips from the academy.
NUSRL Vice Chancellor Keshav Rao greeted her on passing the entrance examination and said that when people like Sheetal, who belong to the grass root levels of society, study Law then true value of the subject can be realised.