Photos: Delhi’s informal classrooms take schools to underprivileged children

Across Delhi, many informal schools function underneath flyovers, inside shanties, in the shade of trees and, at times, even on the roadside. The volunteers behind these initiatives are motivated to give underprivileged kids a better chance at life. Many of them have enrolled in municipal and government schools, as well as in graduation and diploma courses. There are even kids who are first in their family to read and write. On Teacher’s Day, HT takes a look at volunteer teachers who run informal classrooms across Delhi.

Updated on: Sep 05, 2018 1:33 PM IST

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Dozens of volunteers across Delhi run informal classrooms to help underprivileged students with basic education to enable them to get into formal schools. Many of these “schools” function underneath flyovers, inside shanties, in the shade of trees and, at times, even on the roadside. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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Students on their way to school near Yamuna bank on a rainy day. Hundreds of informal schools are running across the Capital, but there is no official data on their tally. Sanjay Goel, director at the Delhi government’s Directorate of Education said that they have relaxed many admission norms to help students studying in these schools enter formal education and are giving admission to classes based on their age. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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In east Delhi’s Yamuna Khadar, Pankaj Kandpal’s classroom operates from under a tree. Set-up in 2016, this classroom with black tarpaulin making the roof, lacking walls or cemented floor has most students, between 4 to 12, coming from a nearby slum. Kandpal said that he noticed the residents were daily wagers and didn’t send kids to school. He started this classroom to teach them basic Hindi, English and Mathematics. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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A few kilometres away, another “school” operates from under a Metro bridge near Akshardham. The “Free School: Under the Bridge”, founded by Rajesh Kumar, had around 300 students from the slums dotting the banks of the Yamuna and more than 200 students of them have joined formal education at municipal and government schools nearby. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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Among Kumar’s students three students have also enrolled in graduation courses at Indira Gandhi Open University this year. Last year, 10 students from the school did diploma in pharmacy from the Delhi government’s department of training and technical education. Back at Kandpal’s classroom, in the last two years, around 100 students have secured admission in a government school in Mayur Vihar Pocket 4. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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In the initial years Kumar was all alone and it was very difficult for him to convince parents to send their children to a school that does not even have a structure. Today, the school has more than 20 volunteers who come here to teach. Since, Kandpal’s school does not charge any fee, Chotte Lal, 46, a teacher at the school does a part-time job to support his family. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)

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While preparing for their Teacher’s Day surprise at Kumar’s school, Subhash, who got admission in Class 7 at a government school last year said these are the best teachers they have ever had. And officials at the Mayur Vihar school said that students coming from Kandpal’s classroom are “smart”. Most of them know basic reading and mathematics making it easy for schools to enrol them. (Sushil Kumar / HT Photo)