TIRUCHY: “The number you’re trying to reach is not available at the moment,” echoes the recording whenever someone attempts to contact R Dhanusha, a tribal community girl from Sillaiyur village who has secured a centum in mathematics in the class 10 public examination.
As there is no mobile phone tower in her place, it’s quite tricky to reach out to Dhanusha and her parents, who are cashew farm workers in the village at Vannadu panchayat, nestled in the hills of Pachamalai. In order to talk to TNIE, she had to walk over a kilometre to get connectivity.
A student of Government Tribal Residential Higher Secondary School in Chinna Illupur, Dhanusha is the only student among all the five tribal residential schools in the Thuraiyur region to score a centum in the boards this year. Scoring a total of 450 marks, Dhanusha is also the topper of her school.
With her voice breaking up over the call, Dhanusha said, “I travelled back and forth to my village on weekends to work alongside my parents in the agriculture field. When my father goes to work in the downhill area, I take responsibility of the field along with my mother.”
Rathika, mother of Dhanusha, said, “We are cashew cultivators by profession. Along with her studies, she helped us a lot with work. Whatever she opts to study, we will stand by her and help her achieve her dream.”
P Selvam, headmaster of the school, said, “We are happy that our student has achieved a centum. She has scored 450 in the exam and topped in the school. Hailing from a poor background, she was able to achieve this through her hard work under teachers’ guidance. Since she is staying in the hostel, we gave her focused training.” He added, “If she had scored more than 90 in English, she might have scored above 480, setting a record for the highest marks scored by a student in the school’s history. We are aiming for more centums in the next year.”
The same school achieved two centums in Science last year in the tenth public examination, as per sources.
Dhanusha said, “I want to become a Collector (IAS officer) and do good for the people in my area. I want to thank my teacher R Suji and the headmaster for making this possible.”