Inspirations

Guriya Khatoon had been a child labourer since she was nine years old. The UNICEF chose her to represent the socially excluded children at a conference in London.


Two years ago, she could not read or write. Last month, she addressed a United Nations children’s conference in London where she was hailed as a model in self-improvement.


The UN’s Children’s Fund (UNICEF) chose her to represent the socially excluded children of India, those who have been deprived because of poverty and their social class, at the launch of the UNICEF report on, “The State of the World’s Children 2006.”


Guriya is one of the six children from a poor Muslim family in the Karmadi village in Gaya district of Bihar state. She has seen dire poverty. Guriya, now, 13-years old, had been a child labourer since she was nine-years old.


Her father, Mohammad Salim Ansari, is an unskilled labourer. Her mother, Rehana Khatoon, is a farm labourer in the village. When Guriya turned nine, she started working as a labourer on the farm with her mother. Her younger sister took over Guriya’s role of looking after the home and the other children.


After returning to work as a child labourer, Guriya got her chance to study when volunteers from a women’s development programme, Mahila Samakhya Samiti, visited the village to speak about free education. Guriya convinced her mother to let her go to the organisation’s informal residential school for nine months in September 2003. At the school, she met other girls from similar backgrounds. In nine months, she completed five years worth of studies and learned to read, write, as well as karate, yoga, painting, embroidery and other skills. After completing the course, she joined a regular government school in the next village and is now in the seventh standard.


Observing Guriya’s transfor-mation, four of her friends from the village were also enrolled in school and now three of her sisters and a few cousins have started their education.


“I walk eight kilometres to school every day with my friends and then in the afternoon we all sit in our courtyard and I help others with their school work,” she says.


Anupam Srivastava is the communications officer for UNICEF in Bihar and says Guriya’s spirit set her apart. “We were looking for someone who can represent socially excluded children in India. Guriya has individual strength by which she has overcome her circumstances, but what makes her special is that she is committed to helping other children in her village study and learn”