For Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) students, receiving an education is undoubtedly an important step towards escaping the vicious cycle of poverty and societal disparity they face. However, it is only one part of the solution.
The KGBV scheme was launched in 2004 by the government of India, which defines them as “residential schools at upper primary level...for girls belonging predominantly to the SC, ST, OBC and minorities...in educationally backward blocks (EBBs).” The scheme targets rural areas where female literacy is below the national average (65.46%); the gender gap in literacy is above the national average (16.86%) (Census 2011); and/or, remote areas with a large number of out-of-school girls. The scheme provides for a minimum quota of 75% of the seats for girls belonging to SC, ST, OBC or minority communities, and priority for the remaining 25% is accorded to girls from families below poverty line (estimated at INR 32 or 0.49 USD per capita per day expenditure).
However, teachers in KGBVs are undertrained and too resource-starved to positively influence the life outcomes of the enrolled girls, compounding these girls' plight are two factors - the fragility of parent-teacher relationships due to apathy, and the societal norms that do not value girls nor their education. The concerns listed below were highlighted in a National Consultation by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), along with concerns regarding the uncertain future of KGBV students:
With girls trapped in an environment that is unresponsive to their needs and fuelled by apathy, education fails to positively affect their life trajectories. The cycle of repression in their lives is not broken by education, nor are the promises of empowerment, autonomy and respect afforded by education met. Instead, girls continue to be vulnerable to physical and sexual abuse and forced child marriage.
The Aarohini Initiative promotes an expanded concept of education to ensure that the focus is not just on achieving learning outcomes, but also on empowering the students to achieve better life outcomes. The program thus enables the girls to perceive themselves as autonomous individuals, and aims to develop their capacity to resist discrimination and fight for their rights.
Through our journey, we also recognized that it is equally imperative to include boys in the conversations on gender equality in order to achieve a more egalitarian society. With this in mind, we have developed a curriculum designed to engage boys using critical feminist pedagogy in order to help them deconstruct patriarchy and harmful constructs of masculinity. The curriculum is based on extensive work with children at Prerna Boys School, and is now used by the Aarohini Initiative as well, with the aim of helping men and boys understand the systemic gender-based discrimination that occurs under patriarchy, reframe their notions of what it means to be a boy and a man, and become advocates for the women and girls in their lives.
