Varanasi NGO empowers first-generation learners

 https://mattersindia.com/2020/10/varanasi-ngo-empowers-first-generation-learners/

Varanasi: Mahima Bhardwaj is determined to become the first-generation learner in her family.

The 18-year-old girl from Sarai Mohana village of Varanasi in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh belongs to Dalit community.

The village, 9 km away from Varanasi, Hinduism’s holiest city, is sits on the bank of the confluence of Ganga and Varuna rivers.

“My father told me to stop my study when I was in Grade 6,” Bhardwaj recalled.

Her mother supported her, but her father’s mental illnesses forced her to quit school after eight grade.

A local NGO helped the girl to resume her studies. She is the first to study for a Bachelor’s degree in her village.

People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), the NGO that works for the promotion of human rights, provides scholarships to girls such as Bhardwaj to continue their education.

Seven months after Bhardwaj left the school, the PVCHR staff brought her to the office and allowed her turn a new leaf in life.

“I thank PVCHR and 200 Swedish donors who supported my study and provided valuable knowledge of life skills and hope to continue my study,” Bhardwaj, who studies for a degree in commerce, told Matters India.

She is happy that her dream to work in a bank would soon be fulfilled.

She has promised to help other poor girls to study after getting her job.

Varsha Kumari, is another girl, facing struggles.

Her father is alcoholic. The only source of income is her mother’s job.

However, the pandemic has deprived her mother of a stable work.

PVCHR with the support of Swedish donors provided a scholarship for her studies.

The NGO support helped her enroll for the Bachelor of Arts course. She is a now the second year of Bachelors course at Government Women Post Graduate College, Kailhat, Mirzapur, Uttar Pradesh.

Kumari now makes masks for marginalized people, health workers and social workers in Covid-19 times with PVCHR support.

Kumari and Bhardwaj are two beneficiaries of PVCHR which is providing scholarships to poor girls since 2005.

About 80 percent girls helped by the NGO are first-generation learners. They hail from the Scheduled Caste community (90 percent) and the rest from the Other Backward Classes. Most girls are from Uttar Pradesh with a few from Jharkhand and Maharashtra states,

“It is one of the most important investments of our organization which is creating a base of real democracy through the resilience of girls’ power and marginalized communities,” Lenin Raghuvanshi, founder and CEO of PVCHR, told Matters India.

Educating girls from vulnerable and marginalized community is a necessary step for the elimination of democratic gaps based on caste and patriarchy, he added.

He claimed that the NGO has helped ten thousand girls for education over the years.

This year, it has been supporting 157 girls from sixth grade to doctoral studies.

One of them is doing her doctorate in Biotechnology at Purvanchal University, Jaunpur, in Uttar Pradesh.

Earlier she did her Masters of Science in Biotechnology at Christ University in Bengaluru, managed by the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate congregation.

“I am happy that our girls doing their studies. Some of them have completed masters in many disciplines and law,” said Shruti Nagvanshi, co-founder of PVCHR and in-charge of the girls’ education project.

One of the girls, Jyoti Kumari ,joined the PVCHR staff as part of the management team. Opportunities and dignity are the two most important for empowerment, said Nagvanshi, who mooted the idea of educating and empowering girls from marginalized communities.

“Once I came out of the house for attending college education, I could realize how lack of opportunities restricts human desire to achieve anything in life,” she said.

It was her self-belief that generated courage within her to participate in social work, learn and be aware of what is happening around her.

“It is my mother who remained as a truly inspiring person to help others grow, especially these girls who need grow in life with grit to make a difference in their lives and the lives of others,” Nagvanshi said.