Harshavardhan Reddy is excited about school. There is a catch though. He is no seven-year-old going to school after two pandemic-affected years. Harshavardhan is an enthusiastic 32-year-old whose driving ambition is to give a facelift to 50 government schools in his hometown.
In Telangana’s Mahabubnagar, where he was born, schools have broken tables, chairs and worn-out blackboards. He was roped in after he transformed Voddera Basti, a village, and a rundown government school, both lacking basic infra-structure by convincing the locals to join him in bringing about the change. The edu-activist has his task set out this time: organise new benches, tables, blackboards, toilets and a clean kitchen to cook mid-day meals for students and staff.
Most social justice warriors have a personal story of injustice to tell, which turned them into crusaders. Soon after getting his engineering degree in 2008, Harshavardhan applied for a fresh passport, but red tape delayed it inordinately. The result was a lost opportunity to study abroad. An irate Harshavardhan took the RTI route to get his passport. In the next two years, he went on to file 300 RTI applications on behalf of family, friends and people who were dealt a rough hand. From questioning local SBI bank officials about why a loan application was rejected to stopping a rice mill from polluting the village, he was relentless. Learning about such success stories, some friends sought Harshavardhan’s help to bring basic civic facilities to their Voddera Basti in 2018.
A meeting with District Collector was a turning point. Impressed with his previous work, the IAS officer invited him to transform 30 villages as part of the Swachh Bharat Mission. His budget was about Rs 40 lakh. The pilot project began in August that year in Voddera Basti whose residents were manual labourers. He asked the collector to do away with the layers of paperwork and assign him just two officers—one for budgeting and the other for technical assistance.
“Under their guidance, in six weeks, we constructed new toilets, sealed defecating dumps and installed new drinking water taps on every street corner. We laid out new roads too,” he boasts. All 45 families of the basti were involved in the work, which saved money on labour costs. That amount was used for the projects.
Harshavardhan, who has a degree in public policy too, replicated the Voddera Basti model in surrounding villages. As news about the social changemaker spread fast, students and teachers of a rundown government school in Panchalingalu village nearby approached him for help. They wanted new tables, chairs, blackboards and garbage bins among other things. The usual paucity of funds had stopped any progress.
Harshavardhan, who also runs a real estate business, believes that there is nothing that cannot be achieved with community support. He convinced every individual associated with the school to join hands. “Each parent contributed Rs 1,000 towards benches. Apart from using government funds, I contributed by buying paint for the benches and walls, and the students painted it,” he recalls.
Teachers bought their own boards and chairs. Over 200 people worked voluntarily for 1,600 hours for 30 days to change the face of the school. There is no rest for the motivated. A buoyant Harshavardhan has started to work on replicating his feat in 50 schools in Telangana. Will he be able to complete it by the end of 2022? “One step and one school at a time, I shall,” is his promise.