‘Ashar Alo’ spreads from Slovenia to South 24-Parganas

PIYALI (SOUTH 24-PARGANAS): Slovenian ambassador Jožef Drofenik’s visit to ‘Ashar Alo’ — a primary school from KG to Class VIII in Piyali — on Saturday was a tribute to a decade-long work by a Slovenian national Mojca Pijk and her Indian husband Anup Gayen.
Pijk and Gayen’s dream to set up a school to bring back the school dropouts among village girls is a reality now.The school in Piyali, 28 kilometres south of Kolkata, houses around 140 students.
For Anup, this dream started much before he met, fell in love and later married Mojca. Having spent his childhood at a home for the underprivileged in Berhampore, Anup still remembers his struggle being a courier delivery boy and a car mechanic.
His calling came when he started working for a social service organisation in remote South 24 Parganas villages. “I felt bad when I watched the pitiable condition of village girls. The poor parents had no choice, but get them married early. The girls often fell prey to traffickers. I thought I should do something for them, but I was in a very pitiable condition myself,” recollects Gayen.
Soon after that Gayen met Mojca who had come to India from Slovenia’s Podreca (not far from its capital Ljubljana) driven by her passion for social work. “Very often Anup would share his dream with me. I was equally interested to do something for these girls. We started dreaming together,” Mojca said. In 2006, Mojca and Anup married and started living in Sonarpur. “We then started to arrange funds. Mojca, through her connections in the West did the bulk of it,” Anup said.
Today, the school provides education, uniforms and midday meals free of cost. Only Rs 20 is taken per month from each student as a token, Mojca said. “Now, we have no problems in running the school. Funding is adequate as our friends from Germany and Slovenia continue to contribute to the school’s progress,” Anup said. Among the sponsors are Susan Pechel, a German doctor, who was delighted on Saturday when the schoolchildren spoke to her in fluent English.
It isn’t just Anup and Mojca. Their two children Izak (11) and Sara (6) are also completely at ease in here. They speak four languages — Slovenian, Bengali, Hindi and English. They, however, speak to the schoolchildren in English and Bengali and also double up as their playmates.
Anup says they follow the state board syllabus. They, however, do not have any affiliation. “For affiliation we should have all teachers with BEd degrees. However, right now among the seven teachers we have, only two have BEd degrees. The others have primary-teacher training, or Montessori-teacher training,” Anup said.