Access to Education

As part of the SBI Youth for India Fellowship, Lakshmi Nair moved to Satbunga, a remote village located in Nainital district in Uttarakhand to work with the Central Himalayan Rural Action Group. Here's her story.

The travel industry labels these regions offbeat and the people exotic, downplaying their everyday reality—limited access to food, healthcare, education and employment.

This is the story of thousands of kids studying in government schools in Bengaluru. The first-generation school-goers. The children of migrant and daily wage labourers who were empowered with wings to soar to their dreams, by city-based NGO, Dream School Foundation.

Fondly known as Malik Bhai, the 29-year-old tea seller has been spending 80 per cent of his income to educate more than 40 underprivileged children since the last three years!

The Better India caught up with four TikTok content creators who are using the social media platform to drive change in the lives of millions of their followers.

Today, we look at the stories of five teachers who are empowering students from impoverished backgrounds with free coaching, helping them pursue their engineering and medical dreams.

"Things that we take for granted are often the most crucial. A desk, chair or a blackboard might sound to be the most basic requirement in a school and yet there are hundreds of schools in rural India that are devoid of them. This was our attempt to break that bubble and bring forth a sustainable solution."

“Together we wanted to use our knowledge for something that mattered and had a larger impact.”

A whiteboard, markers, and a duster for the teachers and a carpet laid on the ground for them to sit on, 15 such study centres across Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and recently, Rajasthan, are providing free-of-cost education for slum and street kids since 2013.

He visited the surrounding slums of Vishrantwadi and interacted with widows and divorced women. With no financial security, these women were struggling to raise their kids. Education was a luxury, a distant dream. Vinayak changed that too.