I had the option to choose a school out of two, so I chose this school because I really liked the playground here as I have always been interested in sports. When I was studying at Navodaya School, I used to play every sport available there.

Children who study in the villages are often limited to the village itself. When I came here, I started playing sports along with teaching students and played along with the children myself. Then I saw that the number of students enrolled at the school started increasing gradually. Today, there are around 300 students studying here, whereas initially in 2015, there were only 175 students enrolled.

In 2018, with the help of my children, we became the block champions, and then the District Education Department honored these children. Although we play many games in our school, we are best at Kabaddi.

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Wherever we go, whatever competitive event we participate in, we always win at Kabaddi. In the beginning, I was worried because guardians were hesitant to send their girls, and they were concerned about their safety and security.

But I convinced them and took the risk, and eventually, when they won medals, they trusted me. After that, nothing could stop us. Once, a child injured his hand while playing Kabaddi and I paid for his medical treatment. Trust is also very important to win.

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Last year, our students also played state-level basketball and the district magistrate honored them and provided them with sports kits.

My dream is that every child should play some sport. Our children have medals at the state level and have won medals in open competitions as well. The Government of India runs a program called ‘Khelo India’ in which 9 of our children have been selected. These children use technology, like learning art from YouTube to learn how to win games. Surprisingly, wherever they go for competitions, 8-10 children come from other schools, but we send 40-50 children from our school to play different games.

The government has made a decision to build a sports complex inside our school. This is the result of our hard work. On my birthday, on August 15, 2019, I gifted T-shirts to 60 students. Many children played wearing those T-shirts and also won medals.

As told to Danish Iqbal who interns for Gaon Connection