Last December, I was on a short trip to a Bihar village after a gap of 5 years. Landing in my mom's birthplace, I was anxious to see the change that the Nitish Kumar government had brought about in the small village called Gosain Gaon in Bhagalpur District.
Considering my own education, many young kids of my family were forcefully sent to me to get some "gyaan" on career and life. As always, the craze for government jobs is tremendous in Bihar and especially in upper caste families. While talking to the kids, most of them in class 10, 11 and 12, I realized that a lot had changed when I had last met these kids in their primary school days. All the kids studied in Convent schools despite the fact that one of my uncles is a government school teacher himself. Most of them were quite aware about JEE etc and some were also taking coaching in the nearby town of Naugachhia, solving problems from H.C.Verma's "Concept of Physics". This was heartening. One of the girls (my niece) who was in Class 11th, asked me some difficult calculus sums and I was amazed at her knowledge. She appeared to be the most intelligent of all and I have a hunch that she will get through some good engineering college next year.
What was also noteworthy was the change in attitude of the parents. Parents were ready to send their kids to Kota or other big cities to do coaching for JEE. People knew about various other engineering entrance exams as well and for some weird reason Kalinga Institute of Engineering was quite popular after IITs and NITs. However, these were parents and kids of Brahmins and hence were the first in the village to grab the benefits of any new initiative taken in the education sector.
Just behind our place in Gosain Gaon (i.e., the Brahmin Tola), there lies another community (tola) of Haadis. They are an ex-untouchable caste and I vividly remember how one of its adults was badly beaten by one of my uncles about ten years ago when he had not stopped my elder brother from drinking water at his aangan's handpump. The adults, as well as the kids, used to come to our houses during ceremonies to clean floors and clothes and do other sundry manual labour and would get leftovers of the ceremonial meals. This time, however, the kids were reluctant to do such jobs. The adults did come to clean up but demanded cash in lieu of the work and denied food being given. I could see my aunties swearing at the Hadini for being so shameless in asking for money from a Brahmin family, but the rustic lady insisted she wouldn't accept anything but cash. Finally, the uncles loosened their pockets to avoid a lady brawl.
Some of my cousins, who were themselves preparing for JEE type exams, joked about how the Haadi kid wouldn't agree to come to work in their houses. "These rascals now even go to school. Look at their smugness and attitude." It was weird to see 16-year old Brahmin kids being so aware and arrogantly proud of being upper caste and swearing at a Dalit kid. There was also the frustration that the Haadis had got pucca houses built from the finds gained through Indira Awas Yojana. I tried talking to my Teacher Uncle and understand why the caste attitudes hadn't changed but he didn't have any convincing answers. My questions were seen as an urban outsider's awkward reactions to something that was quite normal.
Nevertheless, in one of the evenings. I took a stroll alongside the pucca houses of the Haadis, making sure that my mom and uncles do not know about it. I saw the kids playing the typical rural games, but at the same time there were kids playing cricket (more of a gully-cricket). It was probably some serious match and one of the kids had a notebook in hand where he was scribbling the scores- runs, overs and wickets.
After our short stay in the village, me and mom headed back to Bokaro. We walked to the village chowk, where we would get the rickshaw to go the auto-stand. It was early morning. I saw some kids studying in a big hall. My uncle told me that it was Maths and Physics coaching center. Few steps away, I saw a thatched hut with about 50 kids where one kid was reciting the table of 8 and other kids repeating after them. This was also a privately run primary school by a unemployed graduate of the village. While we were waiting for the rickshaw, we heard that the rickshaw-puller was having his breakfast. He arrived shortly. He must have been from a Dalit caste, as was clear by his reactions on seeing Brahmin clients waiting to board his vehicle. Me and mom sat on the rickshaw. He asked for few minutes. He took out 5 rupees from his pocket and gave to a young girl standing there in her school uniform with the bag on her back. The rickshaw-puller told her,"buy some toffees while going to school" in a loving tone and then with a stern voice continued,"and finish your english and maths homework before I come back in the evening; don't play too much in the afternoon." The girl, the rickshaw-puller's daughter smiled and sat on another rickshaw that was carrying other kids in the same uniform to probably another English medium school.
The girl didn't care if there were Brahmin customers waiting for her dad, and I think she wouldn't even know what a Brahmin is (at least I hope so). But what caught my attention was that I did not find anybody going to a government school, irrespective of caste or class, yet I saw all kids going to school, nevertheless.
