Fakir Mohan University, situated in Balasore, Odisha, is on a mission to help the nearby tribal villages of Nuapadhi and Mardarajpur. The varsity has decided to adopt the villages and come up with initiatives to make these villages free of school dropouts, drug abuse and sorcery.
Health, eye and dental check-up programmes, along with child immunisation and food nutrition camps, have been organised in these villages by the VC and staff of Fakir Mohan University. They have also personally met children and their parents to make them aware of the importance of education and the evils of liquor consumption.
According to a report by The New Indian Express, the people of these villages allegedly have no desire to send their children to nearby schools. Moreover, the parents spend most of the money they earn (by breaking stones in crusher units located near their villages) on consuming alcohol.
Most of the children from these villages are thus dropouts since the COVID-19 lockdown happened. It has also been stated in the report that the villagers are not aware of the importance of education, nor the consequences of regular drinking.
Professor Santosh Kumar Tripathy, Vice-Chancellor of the university, said that the two villages are located just outside the boundary walls of the university. He, along with the varsity staff, came to notice that the children roamed outside the premises and often engaged in the stone-breaking work with their parents instead of attending school.
The VC informed that the children stopped going to school after the COVID-19 lockdown. When the staff asked them about this, they replied that they were afraid to look at their textbooks. The staff said that due to the 2-year-gap, during which schools remained shut, the children have forgotten their education. And they were forced to break stones with their parents during the period.
The New Indian Express report also mentions that apart from poverty, the villagers also suffer from poor health due to alcohol consumption. They also believe in sorcery due to their ignorance and seek the help of tantriks and quacks instead of going to the hospitals. There are constant quarrels in the families as well. And all this impacts the children negatively.
VC Tripathy informed that keeping all these regularly reported incidents in view, and looking at the increasing number of school dropouts, the university adopted the two villages to educationally empower the children and encourage the tribal people to stay away from liquor.
"We are giving more priority to the development of education, health and community developments. There is a government-run high school in Mardarajpur village but the children above 15 years did not go there. The university started the initiative for the development of the two villages from September 2021," he said.
The VC informed that parents were encouraged to send their children to a nearby school to continue their education. At least 35 children out of the total 170 are now attending school, Tripathy said. The varsity is also making efforts to check that the students continue their schooling.
Rabi Singh, the parent of a dropout, expressed that his son went to school due to the extended support of the VC and the university staff. He thanked Dr Amulya Acharya, Associate Professor, Dr Pratima Pradhan, Reader in the Education Department and Dr Jagannath Behera, NSS Programme Officer, for their efforts. "I am happy and try my best to encourage my neighbours not to consume alcohol," he said, as per The New Indian Express.
