EDUCATION
PROVIDES
A GLIMMER
OF HOPE
Bodhgaya, one of the most important
Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the world,
is a location of polar opposites, Emily
Smith discovered.
F
or thousands of pilgrims and monks from all over the
world, it is the holiest place on the planet ¬– Buddhism’s
Mecca. For tourists, it is a crazy Indian town filled with
pristine temples, market stalls and street food. For the
locals it’s life. For the poorest of those, it’s an opportunity
to beg for food and money.
The Mahabodhi Temple towers over Bodhgaya, in Bihar,
north-east India, and is the area’s main attraction. Tourists also
flock to the 25-metre Great Buddha Statue, the Mahakala Cave
¬- where Buddha is said to have meditated for six years without
food and water - and Sujata Temple, where Buddhists say Gautama
Siddhartha (Buddha) was given milk rice upon leaving the cave.
Outside the gates of the historic monuments, lines
of men and women push their children, often disabled
and deformed, into the paths of tourists and pilgrims
to beg for money and food. These children sit for hours
in temperatures exceeding 40C in the summer - no
education and little hope. But, for all of India’s faults,
most children, especially in Bodhgaya, have access to free
education.
One free school is the Lord Buddha Charitable School,
situated in Chora, 6km from Bodhgaya on the opposite
side of a river that runs dry outside the rainy season.
Chora’s locals are known as ‘untouchables’ ¬–
members of Indian society who rank so low they do not
fall into its controversial class system known as caste.
So-called untouchables perform the lowest paid jobs.
Despite being known as the lowest in society, more than
half of the families living in Chora send their children
to school. About 80 children attend the Lord Buddha Charitable
School for two hours a day.
‘We believe that if we can give time and education to some
people then there is hope that their future will be bright,’ says
Kapil (29), one of the founders of the charity school.
‘Most of the people in Chora are of the untouchable caste. They
don’t own any land. Families in Chora might live off as little as 200
rupees a day (£2) – which will need to support a family of five.’
48
On a cold February morning,
as the sun peaks above the mist-
covered rice fields, children, many
wearing no shoes, dirty t-shirts and
ripped trousers, run from their clay
homes as the school cowbell chimes.
The boys and girls, clutching at their
tired pencils and notepads, greet
European volunteers with warm smiles and lots of hand-shaking.
Mahendra (38), co-founder of the school, explained that before
the facility was opened children from Chora would have to walk
for over an hour into neighbouring village Sujata to go to school.
‘A volunteer came to help in the school in Sujata and they knew
there was no school in Chora,’ Mahendra recalls. ‘They went and
knocked on doors in Chora and asked people whether they wanted
a medical centre or a school – they said school.’