This is a story of a student of Shibpur Village of Nadia District in West Bengal. Nineteen years old Naresh Mondal’s father died when he was 14 and studying in class VIII. His elder brother Ramesh, 22, had to leave study to support family of four including mother and sister Amita, 17, and started working as daily labor earning Rs.1200 ($30) per month.
Naresh however pulled up from the trauma and passed secondary examination by scoring over 80% marks and then again passed the Higher Secondary examination by scoring 75% marks with over 80% marks in Physics and Mathematics.
As Ramesh,s earnings were not enough, Naresh could not enroll in science stream and joined as a Geography honors student to study B.Sc. However Basanti, the mother of the three was finding it still impossible to meet the study expenses of both Naresh and Amita, who is studying in class XI.
So, Basanti told Amita to leave study and do household chores so that Naresh could continue his study. Listening this from her mother, Amita’s world came crumbling down and she wept and wept for hours shutting the door of the room.
When Naresh returned from college he learnt about mother’s decision. He took a stunning decision in a flash of a second and told Amita, “Don’t worry. You will study and I will quit college”.
“Dada’s (brother’s) decision stunned us and I broke down for the second time. Dada had never stood second from class V onwards and was a much better student and a pride of this village” said a weeping Amita.
Naresh left for Mumbai, last month, to work as a construction labor along with 140 others, who all were school dropouts.
This is an eye-opener in a society where education of girls is almost always regarded as secondary to boys.