Words scraped against my brain as I Iay down, exhausted, in my stark white hostel room. I tried to find comfort in the lingering smell of the oil my roommate was massaging her knees with—that smell spelt care. Setting my alarm for five the next morning, my innards groaned.
I am a 23-year-old student from Haryana, who studied at Delhi University (DU) for her BA, and at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) for her MA. Over time, I have found that education is something I hold absurdly close to my heart.
It is often said that a film should either entertain, engage, or educate (not in the same order though). And in our country, one obsessed with cinema, we expect a film to entertain us and make everything larger than life and extraordinary.
One evening, last year, I finally coaxed my mother to sit down and take pause from constantly running around the house. I had been following her around for days to have this conversation. Sometimes, she silently smiled, and at other times, she eluded me. But that evening, she let her guard down.
“A library is not about buying shelves and putting in books. Anyone can do that! It’s about how one can put their heart and soul into it. You have to invest dil se.”
I want to tell this story in two parts. In one, the expectation of meritocracy oppresses everyone; in the other, even access to academic oppression is denied.
Savarnas don’t know caste—the same way a fish does not know water. When you breathe, see, feel, and thrive within a system, it is difficult to notice it, let alone know it. How does a fish then know water? By starting to know itself, of course.
Asnara walks to the FACE centre, crossing puddles and also generations of women from her community making and selling beedis. Beedi-making is a common household occupation for women and girls in Pakur, Jharkhand where Asnara lives with her family.
When Muskan said “Hamare yahaan yeh sab chalta hi nahi hai” (These things aren’t allowed in our areas), we couldn’t help but notice that she said it for feeling love as well as anger.
Welcome to the second edition of our Teacher Talks series where we meet first generation learners who share their stories of their own education and of teaching in centres for informal education.
