The Hindu Business Line : They join the tech tribe

Mama, Sudam, Tapas, Amrita, Sukhadeb and others of their ilk would have been as ignorant about computers and IT as their folks back home in the villages had it not been for the initiative taken at KISS to facilitate IT literacy among its students.

Ambar Singh Roy

Twelve-year-old Mama Majhi is the first person ever in her family to go to school. The tribal girl, who belongs to the Santhal community, is a student of Class VII in the Bhubaneswar-based Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), a residential school of 7,000 tribal students drawn from across 23 tribal-dominated districts in Orissa.

Mama’s tryst with computers began recently when she realised that she loved to play with the “mouse” and draw sketches on the computer screen. When she grows up, she wants to work in a “proper office” for her economic empowerment. And she believes that a computer will make her daily routine “easier”.

Mama’s classmate Sudam Majhi was part of the KISS Under-13 rugby team that emerged runners-up in the Under-13 rugby championship that was held in England in April this year. Sudam is picking up basic computer literacy skills and hopes to leverage on simulation tools to improve his game.

For Tapas Kumar Naik, computerisation and deployment of IT tools can help solve many problems in our nation and make the lives of its citizens easier. The Class XII student, who participated in the National Children’s Science Congress held in Baramati, Maharashtra, last year, wants to go back to his village in Mayurbhanj district after completing his education and “work to empower my fellow villagers with IT deployment”.

Seventeen-year-old Bhagya Lakshmi Barik is known for his acting skills and his ability to sing melodious songs. He loves watching Cartoon Network and harbours ambitions of becoming an animation filmmaker when he grows up. He is learning the nuances of computers as he wants to leverage on IT “for making animation films and also for incorporating special effects” in other films that he might make. For Bhagya Lakshmi, the Internet is the “gateway to the world”.

Twelve-year-old Adivasi girl Amrita Nayak never knew what a computer looked like till she left her village in Gajapati district to join KISS in Bhubaneswar.

Sukhadeb Kirsani’s fellow “Gabada” tribesmen in remote Koraput district have neither seen a computer nor do they know what the “machine” can do for them.

Introductory computer education is imparted from Class VI onwards even as formal, structured computer training — in MS Office, DOS, etc — is introduced from Class VIII onwards.

Students take turns to attend classes at the well-equipped computer laboratory that has been set up within the KISS campus. They are upbeat on their ability to acquire computer knowledge and ensure that they are able to leverage on the skills they acquire later in their lives.

KISS students’ optimism on this score was most aptly put across by Ajit Kumar Naik, a 14-year-old orphan boy from Mayurbhanj who has lost all members of his family to destiny: “I shall use the IT knowledge I acquire to discharge my duties more efficiently when I grow up and, thus, make a difference to society”. That is one dream that is shared by students at KISS, who represent 55 out of the 63 tribes that live in Orissa’s villages.

ambar_singhroy@rediffmail.com

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