Rajewadi village in Nashik, Maharashtra has traditionally witnessed high drop-out rates from schools. Apart from the usual reasons that children in Indian state-run schools drop out because, Rajewadi also has an alcoholism problem. According to an exclusive report on The Times of India, most residents of the village are addicted to alcohol, with the children joining the families at times.
However, the efforts of a teacher have put the zilla parishad school - which has seen a majority of its students drop-out in the past - back on track. TOI reports that Pankaj Dashpute, with his colleagues Hemantkumar Ahire and Sunita Sonawane not only refurbished the decrepit school, their efforts encouraged parents to send their children back to school.
"Their labour of love has borne fruit in good measure — today, as many as 106 students attend school from classes 1 to 5! The first task that Dashpute and his colleagues got down to was levelling the uneven ground at the school and painting the classrooms themselves. They began maintaining the two toilet units in the school and also managed to repair the compound wall, but the villagers broke parts of it." the report adds.
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