School on wheels: An initiative of Vidya Bharati
Dr. Jagadindra Raychoudhury

Once Swami Vivekananda said, “We want that education, by which character is formed, strength of mind is increased, intellect is expanded and by which one can stand on one’s own feet.”
But sometimes, the spirit of the entire system gets lost due to some social, political and ethnic unrest in a particular region. The normalcy is completely lost under this state of affairs and mostly the student’s community would be deprived from their thirst of learning process and as a result a big gap existed amidst them.

Russia-Ukraine war is one of the burning examples which globally out broke and a good number of Indian students were under purview of that situation that went for higher study in Ukraine especially in medical science. They are bound to get back to India because the conflict is still continuing.
This type of war is not only damaging property, buildings and humans’ life but also breaking social life completely especially the nurturing of younger generation. In our north east, Manipur is also reeling under some conflict between two communities, Kuki and Meitei and tensions boiled over when Kukis began protesting against the demands from Meiteis to be given official tribal status.
Kukis argued that their strength was already influenced on government and society, allowing them to buy land or settle in predominantly kuki areas. During this conflict, village after village were ablaze and the Meitei’s people compelled to shift in relief camps where school going students were generously the victim of conflict.
The root cause of Manipur violence is the dispute stemming from the rivalry between the Meitei majority and the Kuki-ZO tribe which make up about 16 percent of its population. The Meitei population is predominantly Hindu and lives, largely in the capital Imphal and the valleys around it. To give some support especially for the students community Vidya Bharati Purbottor Khestra has taken an initiative in this regard.
Vidya Bharati Purbottor Kshetra is a sister organization of Vidya Bharati which was established in Gorakhpur in the year 1953 looking after the education sector with the concept of Bharatiyata and spread over across India. Likewise Vidya Bharati also established schools in the northeast region and more than 600 schools are running at present.
Vidya Bharati is always in search for those thrust areas where the ray of light in education has not even reached and for that purpose with the help of local communities tries to establish schools for the benefit of those students. But this practice is not possible all the time and in that case a single teacher is deputed for teaching to students from their localities for smooth running of teaching- learning process which is called ‘Ekal vidyalaya’(Single teacher).
The unrest situation in Manipur prevailing almost a year back might be continuing further more and keeping in mind Vidya Bharati purbottor Kshetra took an initiative to provide education to the needy students who are still in relief camps. To find out this solution, we have planned to run a bus where all facilities of educational tools will be available in the name of ‘School on wheels’.

In this connection, we approached to PVL Krishnamurthy, Chairman of NEDFI and according to his advice met Chief General Manager of State Bank of India Vincent MD. Accordingly, we applied for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) fund and it was generated through Mutual Fund of State Bank of India. The indoor of the bus was designed for student’s friendly facilities which give them class room environment.
The book self was framed on both the sides inside the bus and tables with stool are also provided for computer access. The students will be provided laptops through which they can access their computer based study where facility of wi fi will be also be available. Inside the bus a LCD projector with screen is also installed and that can be utilized by students as of when it’s needed.
Some playing tools for sports activities both indoor and outdoor games may also be available in side the bus. The bus is well decorated with various pictures of children activities impregnated on outside of it and making it colorful for the attraction of the students. Four teachers will be deputed in the bus for teaching or other sports activities.
The ‘school on wheels’ will move from one camp to other with a stipulated period of time. It will not be an issue for moving the bus in an around the relief camps because the camps are within the jurisdiction of 10 to 12 kilometers. A well managed committee is formed in Manipur itself to look after the noble purpose and hoping to be benefited the needy students who are deprived of regular schooling.
It is to be noted that Assam State Government has also launched Vidya Rath—School on wheels project on the occasion of India’s 76th Independence Day at a function held at the premises of Gauhati High Court. This project was aimed at imparting elementary education to economically challenged children of the society. The main concept of the project is to bring our children who are hitherto remaining outside the ambit of formal education.

However, Vidya Bharati Purbottor Khestra is looking after proper education under Vidya Bharati running school across North east region comprising of seven states and guiding schools for all round development equipped with all modern facilities of learning process. It also looks after other activities like sports, health, science related projects etc. where students participated in a phase manner reaching to the National level competition.
On the other hand, additional mode of teaching has been introduced recently, i.e. “School on Wheels” through which it helps to the needy students who are deprived of education in an unrest situation like Manipur. The bus was launched/inagurated on 30th April from the premises of State Bank of India Head office, Dispur to Manipur in presence of all high officials of Bank authority.
Further, in Manipur the same was formally inaugurated by Hon’ble governor of Manipur, Anusuiya Uikey in presence of Chief Secretary of Manipur and officials of Vidya Bharati on 5th May.
Dr. Jagadindra Raychoudhury, Secretary, Vidya Bharati Purbottor Kshetra.
Mahabahu.com is an Online Magazine with collection of premium Assamese and English articles and posts with cultural base and modern thinking. You can send your articles to editor@mahabahu.com / editor@mahabahoo.com (For Assamese article, Unicode font is necessary)