(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) 125 boys and girls from 16 villages in Sankheda taluka who risked their life every day by swimming across the swirling waters of the 600-metre-wide Hiran river to reach school.
Children in villages of Chhota Udepur district in central Gujarat will no more have to swim through a river daily to reach their school thanks to a kind gesture by a United States-based non-resident Indian (NRI) couple.
After reading newspaper reports about the plight of the 125 boys and girls from 16 villages in Sankheda taluka who risked their life every day by swimming across the swirling waters of the 600-metre-wide Hiran river to reach the only state-aided school in Utavadi village Virender Bhalla and his wife Ratna have donated an inflatable boat to the students.
The children now wear an orange life-jacket over a fluorescent yellow raincoat and step into the eight-seater rubber motor boat that takes them to the other side in 10 minutes. Helped by volunteers trained by the Bhallas who run a food charity in Delhi more students then take their turns in batches of eight.
After receiving a strongly-worded notice from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) earlier last month the Gujarat government did wake up from its seven-year slumber to agree to build a bridge to end the plight of the children.
Taking suo motu cognizance of the shocking Press reports the commission had issued a notice to the chief secretary of the state government saying the children’s right to education and safety were being violated.
Gujarat government spokesman and senior minister Nitin Patel told Khaleej Times that the villagers had rejected the district collector’s offer to provide them with boats to ferry the children to the government school.
Hence he said a Rs80-million grant was being released to immediately implement a plan that includes a new bridge which will allow the children to walk or take a bicycle or two-wheeler or even a mini-bus to school.
Earlier this month media reports had highlighted the woes of the schoolchildren who had to swim holding onto brass pots to get to the other side. By road the school is 20km away but parents used to take turns to supervise the children to swim through the river.
For the past seven years villagers had been demanding the construction of a bridge but in vain.
maheshkhaleejtimes.com
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