Lohri glee: This village teacher visits newborn girls with goodies

Aparna Banerji

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, January 11

There were 18 girls in his school last year. This year, the girls have almost doubled with the number reaching 30, thanks to the special ‘Dhiyan Di Lohri’ initiative taken by a schoolteacher.

A village, comprising mostly poor labourers, who were earlier even wary of sending their daughters to school, has now undergone a sea change, due to the initiative by the teacher at the primary school of the village.

The Lohri custom has become such a hit that parents now look forward to the visit by the teacher and the enthusiasm also reflects at the school where the registration of girl students have doubled.

Speaking to The Tribune, Ajmer said: “We earlier used to hold an event at the school on Lohri, celebrating ‘Dhiyan Di Lohri’. The initial years were full of struggle. Parents would be poker-faced. Some wouldn’t understand why I am congratulating them. The school event came with costs and some parents didn’t turn up. That was when I started visiting houses. While initially I used to even scold parents who had a certain attitude about the girl child, now the awareness had dramatically risen. The parents look forward to our visit. We call them before we go and they welcome us joyfully.”

The Nathhewal school also has another charming custom. On every student’s birthday, the school plants a tree.

The school has 57 students of which 30 are girls. While employment at the village is also low, with merely five to six well off families, Ajmer says the initiative is also aimed at slowly empowering the village and making residents understand the importance of education.

Accompanied by the girls of his school (which itself is an award-winning school of the district with plush lawns and state-of-the-art classrooms) wearing green uniforms, Ajmer visits girl children with packets of goodies, congratulates parents on the birth of a girl child and emphasises on the importance of educating children.

This year Ajmer with the school staff and students visited six houses in the village where girls were born. Last year, they had visited eight houses. The staff said many neighbouring schools had also started celebrating ‘Dhiyan Di Lohri’ and spreading awareness in their villages.