Up in the Singalila Ridge bordering Nepal and India, lies the quiet little hamlet of Dhotre in West Bengal, India. At an altitude of nearly 8800 ft, the nights are filled with biting cold and days are filled with hard work; work that requires children to do household chores and adults to carry the heavy weight of livelihood. Such a village has dared to dream. A school named Blossom that has raised the hope for a better future.
3 of the villagers - Sushil Rai, Sangeeta Pradhan and Chinju Sherpa are the staff today, doubling up as teachers and administrators. The school continues to struggle with not having enough teachers and rooms being shared for classes, an absolute minimum of stationaries and study material, some of which is ‘customized’ for need. Amidst this colossal struggle, the teachers manage to hold exams and promote students. Currently the school manages to offer classes till the 7th standard. Children wishing to continue studies after that have to go to the town of Manebhanjyang which is about 19kms from Dhotre – a distance not possible for kids to travel both ways everyday to attend school. As a result, children in Classes 8 to12 have to rent houses and stay together. Often it is just one room with 3 beds and a small, makeshift kitchen. They have an extreme hard life, as they have to cook, keep their house and attend school from such a young age.
A group of individuals from Kolkata (West Bengal, India) are working with the villagers to form a trust that can collect funds and donations to help towards building the school. The long-term target is to help the school stand on it's own feet so that the students can look to give board exams (10th standard) from here one day.