Timeline Photos A Sunday morning with Eso Kichu Kori at Senate Hall, Calcutta University, on 16th July, 2017.
By Sukti Sarkar
To be able to attend the annual Medha and Sopan program of EKK is both a privilege and a deeply humbling experience. For us, the urban and nose in the air folks, who take opportunities and resources as granted, EKK always helps to take a look at reality. Has any one heard of Kanta Chakraborty, a senior teacher in a Bengali medium Behala school who commutes daily from Dum Dum and still has time and funds to look after 20 economically challenged girl students ? With her assistance they are pursuing formal education and other all round development courses. Or about Sumit Mandal, who could not complete his formal education but comprehends the importance of it better than most of us ? Single-handedly he motivates and funds the education of a good number of children in his village in the remote South 24 Parganas. Sumit has also founded a library in his village. EKK has felicitated Kanta Chakraborty and Sumit Mandal with the Barenya Samman this year. But the most stunning story was narrated by Gopal Pramanik, a teacher at Stanford University. Gopal's father left his studies after Class I, his youngest paternal uncle after Class V. His mother worked as a domestic help. Gopal often dropped out of school due to funds crunch but rejoined whenever he managed to save some money which he earned through every possible odd jobs that he could find. All through his mother insisted on the importance of education. After his Madhyamik Exams Gopal enrolled in earth digging work in his village and saved an amount of Rs 3000/- to fund his HS admission etc. Meanwhile, his school teacher (life-science) took interest in him for his brilliant results and provided with necessary guidance. A good position in the JEE helped him secure admission in Jadavpore University and he completed his studies to become a Pharmaceutical Engineer. he worked on stem cell research and was picked up by the Nobel laureate Thomas Sudhov (2013) under whom he is now working at Stanford University.
This year we met Dhananjay Kumbhakar, Subhadra Goswami, Suparna Choulya and many more who have scored very high in their Board finals and have taken admission in various institutions for pursuing higher studies. All 20 of these meritorious but economically challenged students will be supported with scholarships from Eso Kichu Kori and its well wishers. This morning Gopal, Dhananjay, Subhadra, Suparna, Amit and many more made us realize it was high time to erase the word "impossible" from the lexicon. ... See more
