Silent vioces:Creating alternatives for Dalit students

[Akyeame Kwame]

Silent vioces:Creating alternatives for Dalit students

In a UP village where 70 per cent of its population
lives below the poverty line, a former IAS officer
helps Dalit children cross the digital divide

PIYUSH SRIVASTAVA
<http://www.indianexpress.com/about/f...dianexpress.c\
om/full_story.php?content_id=88168&title=Virtual%20prosperity>

*AAU (BANDA): *ELECTRICITY may still be a distant
dream for Dalits in this Uttar Pradesh village where
70 per cent of the families live below the poverty
line and many are bonded labourers, but that has not
stopped their children from learning to use the
internet or handle digital cameras.

Indeed, some Dalits from this village of 360 families,
where half the land is owned by gun-toting Brahmin
landlords, who still regard banks with unease, have
gone on to become teachers, army officers and Railway
officials.

The man behind this silent revolution is a former IAS
officer and son of a former Chief Justice of the
Allahabad High Court. Lalit Uniyal, 58, decided to sow
the seeds of change at Aau village, about 40 km from
the district headquarters Banda, soon after he quit
the IAS. The revolution began in July 1980 at a time
when the two most powerful of the 19 landlord families
in the village held sway across Aau.

These families opposed the entry of modern education
into their village and in the early years there were
many occasions when armed landlords and local
politicians stormed into the school looking for
Uniyal, who had by then managed to get the social
churning underway.

Recalling the difficult early years, Uniyal says:
''During my initial months in Aau, I wanted to create
awareness among the landless labourers but being an
outsider. I received threats from upper caste
politicians and landlords and often considered killing
myself.''

He adds: ''Sometimes, I used to get weakened by the
violent opposition. (and) run away. One day I received
a message from my mother who wrote that if my limbs
are broken they will mend but if my morale breaks,
nothing can restore that.''

''I found that opening a school for Dalit children
would give me legitimacy to stay in the village and
modernise a generation which would question the rights
of the oppressors in future,'' Uniyal adds.

The former IAS officer terms his schoolchildren's 2003
meeting with President A P J Abdul Kalam as ''a
turning point as the feudal lords who were after my
life realised that doing any harm to me or to the
school would cost them dear and stopped threatening me
and the teachers''.

The children converse in Bagheli — the dialect spoken
by the underprivileged — and manage just a few words
of English and Hindi, the language of the upper caste
landlords. Even so, they were thrilled to meet Kalam —
whom they said they wanted to emulate as President —
and university professors to whom they spoke about
their dreams as well as the current social realities.

Aau's students have also visited big towns and hill
stations and are gradually being exposed to modern
life. They are quite confident and want to break the
shackles of the past. And, as in the case of Sangeeta
Kumari, 10, some want to pursue higher studies.

Class VII student Sangeeta, the eldest of three
sisters and a brother, declares: ''I want to study
more and more and grow. I want my sisters and brother
to study, look ahead and break the shackles.'' She
proudly adds that she can work at the computer
unaided.

Poonam, 10, wants to be a computer engineer while
Chandrapal, 12, is eyeing a career as a professional
photographer. They are just a few of the mentally
liberated Dalit children who have benefited
tremendously from Uniyal's decision to set up a school
across eight acres in Aau a quarter century ago.

BACK then, Uniyal bought a small plot of land and
founded the Bhumiheen Sewa Samiti with his savings and
the help of his journalist and civil servant friends.
Gradually, he began to get support from others and
developed the school. The school now generates its own
funds through farming, bee-keeping, steel-sheet work
and pottery, done by children and teachers alike.

A few years ago, Uniyal was introduced by friends to
"Asha for Education", an organisation formed by some
Indians at the University of California to support the
education of underprivileged children in India.

The one-time IAS officer says: ''Initially, we had
only Dalit children. But later I realised that any
artificial segregation from children of the so-called
upper castes would not serve the purpose because
ultimately, the Dalit children have to return to the
same world and struggle for self-respect. So I opened
50 per cent seats for general classes and gave
admission to roughly 30 per cent Dalit girls.
Presently, there are 300 students.''