A 20-year-old tribal woman from Malkangiri in Odisha, who had topped the higher secondary examination in commerce in the district last year, has taken to working as a daily labourer to fund her studies.
Karama Muduli belongs to the Bonda tribe, one of the particularly vulnerable tribal groups in Odisha, and has been working at construction sites over the last few days to pay her miscellaneous fees apart from her hostel expenses for college.
Speaking to HT, Muduli said, “After I passed the higher secondary exam last year, Myra Charitable Trust came forward for help and got me admitted to Rama Devi University. Every month, they also provide Rs.1,000 for hostel expenses. However, it was still difficult for me to meet the cost of education.”
She said that due to the poor condition of her family, they could not afford to pay the fees or even buy books and other stationery items and hence took up the job of working as a labourer during summer vacation from which she earns Rs.220 in daily wages.
Muduli comes from the Padeiguda village of Malkangiri and had created a buzz last year after she became the first of the primitive vulnerable tribal groups to top an examination in the district.
{{/usCountry}}Muduli comes from the Padeiguda village of Malkangiri and had created a buzz last year after she became the first of the primitive vulnerable tribal groups to top an examination in the district.
{{/usCountry}}A student of the Scheduled Tribe & Scheduled Caste Development department-run Higher Secondary School at Govindpalli, Mudulli scored 82.66% in the annual examination conducted by the Council of Higher Secondary Education (CHSE) last year.
According to the Muduli, her parents are marginal farmers while her elder brother Bina studied up to Class 8 before dropping out. She has two younger sisters, Manguli, 18, who had to discontinue her academic pursuits due to poor financial conditions and 13-year-old Sima is a Class 8 student.
According to the 2011 census, with just six per cent, the Bondas are among the tribes with the lowest literacy rate in the state.
Bondas live in highlands, 3,500-feet above sea level, and are spread mostly in 32 villages of Mudulipada and Andrahal panchayats of Khairput block in Malkangiri district, the southernmost district of Odisha. There are about 6,000 Bondas in Odisha.