Free School Under The Bridge
Like every other metro city across the globe, New Delhi is also changing fast socio-economically. Architecturally though, it has remained a horizontal city (unlike New York or Mumbai) but is slowly becoming a maze of flyovers and underpasses.
One of those non-descript flyovers in East Delhi is however different. The space below, with a few trucks and buses parked in one half, comes alive with innocent voices every working day. A free school runs there for the last 15 years for under-privileged children from the slums nearby along the Yamuna River. The school was started with just a few children by one good Samaritan and a few of his friends.
The founder (a small-time businessman now) was too poor to complete his own college education but was determined that children in the neighborhood shouldn’t suffer the same fate and a school came into being under the bridge – without any building, classrooms, benches or any other infrastructure. It never received any registration but slowly grew as more children joined and a few more good Samaritans started teaching. The school now has around 75 students (boys in the morning, girls in the afternoon) learning everything – from Mathematics to History.
This story is not unique, but is different – solely due to rare humanity peeping out of every layer – the teachers here never received any salary, the school was never evicted by the authorities for occupying public space, nobody asked a few art college students to paint the walls or donate black boards, nobody asked some good people to donate money or school uniform once in a while and nobody asked people like me to tell this story.
The last time I went there, I saw a small idol of Lord Ganesha (the Hindu elephant god – the god of wealth and knowledge) lying in the dust in one corner with the students studying at a distance. What a coincidence! These young boys & girls were studying just to get the blessings of Lord Ganesha – to earn a decent living, I thought. As I walked out, I saw flowers starting to bloom on a plant that these children must have watered for months. Change is inevitable, but this one is so good!!
Aniruddha Guha Sarkar lives in New Delhi and is an engineer by education, on I. T. services CxOby profession, and a learning photo-artist by passion. After spending nearly 25 years driven by corporate nothingness across various part of the world, he began exploring the streets of India with his camera every weekend about nine years ago, in search of a more meaningful life.
Today, he focuses on creating street documentaries on socio-economic themes that interests him, rather than pursuing smart street shots. Some of his work has been exhibited in cities such as New York, Dubai, London, Dublin, Livorno and Bologna (Italy), New Delhi, Kolkata, and Varanasi, and has been published in international and national print as well as online magazines.
