BHUBANESWAR : Trust parents to sacrifice their everything for ensuring a better life and future of their children. Days after a milkman of Himachal Pradesh hogged the headlines for having reportedly sold his cow to buy his daughter a smartphone for her online classes, a woman of Odisha sold her gold earrings so that her daughter can attend the virtual classes.
Rita Bhoi of Balisahi at Salepur sold the earrings for Rs 8000 and bought the mobile phone worth Rs 7,500 for her daughter Archita who studies in Class VIII at Rodhapur Government Upper Primary School. Her husband Gagan Bhoi, a daily wage earner has been left with no work on account of the lockdown.
Archita was promoted this year but faced serious problem in attending the classes in the new academic session in the absence of a smart phone. The girl and her classmates were promoted without examination in view of the pandemic.
The teachers visited houses of the students to collect WhatsApp numbers of the parents so that learning materials and video lectures for new class could be send through the school’s group. Since Archita’s parents did not have a smart phone, she started missing out on assignments shared on the WhatsApp group and video lectures on Madhu App launched by the State Government.
On some occasions, Archita visited her friend’s house to collect study material but she did not find it convenient as she had to walk alone for a long distance."The teachers told us that Archita is a brilliant student but will be left behind if she does not study regularly," said Rita.
With no other alternative, the couple decided to sell Rita’s only pair of gold earrings that were gifted to her by her mother during their wedding in 2006. "My mother was very poor and she could not give me anything apart from the earrings. She had asked me to give them to my daughter. Now I realise that these earrings were meant for Archita’s well-being. So, we decided to sell them off for her education. Our economic condition should not be a deterrent for her education," Rita said.
Gagan said he knew a mobile shop owner but as everything is closed, he visited his house and requested him to give the mobile phone. The couple also has a son Biswaranjan who studies in Saraswati Shishu Mandir.
"We already have a loan which we had taken to repair our house that was damaged in cyclone Fani. Our son studies in Class IV and the school is asking us for the readmission fee but we do not have any more funds," said a teary-eyed Rita.