Students have always been the heart and soul of any country.
History is the testimony that in a country like ours, the youth power has always been instrumental in bringing about CHANGE in the mentality, society, and nation at large.
Aastha, a young 18-year old girl hails from Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh and wishes to bring in some positive change in the society.
It was her last year at school, Aastha had millions of dreams for college, as any other teenager holds. She was all set for her Board exams and wished to score well to get admission to the University of Delhi.
Astha was a hardworking and determined girl, full of enthusiasm and hope. Her exams arrived and she gave her the best into it. Aastha was quite sure that she’ll get the admission to any of the top 5 colleges.
The fact that she was ignoring was the “Reservation System” that prevails in the college.
The result day came, Aastha scored 93% in her 12th Board exams. She and her parents were more than happy, they celebrated the joy of crossing another milestone.
Now, it was the time to wait for the government to release the merit list. Everyone was excited and worried at the same time.
Slowly and gradually the list was declared, day by day each college brought out its admission criteria.
Astha could not fit in the top 7 colleges of the University. She was sad and anxious.
Her dreams were shattered, Astha’s father made her feel relaxed and calmed her down.
Although she got into a college but was not satisfied. She cursed herself for not preparing enough.
On her way to Delhi, she came across several people who had a similar motive. Some looked sophisticate and educated while some looked, dwellers. As she reached the college she could sense discrimination of all kinds – region-religion based, caste-creed based and gender-geographies based.
Astha was disheartened to see students scoring 50 percent marks getting admitted into the topmost colleges. Just because they belonged to scheduled caste and scheduled tribes, they were exempted competition of any kind. Their entry into the prestigious colleges was a proverbial ‘cahewalk’!
The deserving students had to suffer. Astha says to her father, “This is the main reason why our education system has been failing over years, the deserving ones are waiting in long lines and the privileged ones are enjoying.”
She further adds on “Dad why has our government even adopted such discriminatory reservation systems in the education field? This system is diluting the quality of education and is degrading our academic output day by day due.”
Her father could understand her pain but was helpless. He could just be a patient listener to her agony.
Astha was RESTLESS.
She had resolved to bring in better opportunities for millions others like her.
She spearheaded a campaign called “The student’s club” in her college. She had firm belief that what students can do, can be done by none.
Astha’s “Student Club” got nod from the college authorities and it got inaugurated on the World Student’s day, 15th October. Also the birth anniversary of our most loved President APJ Abdul Kalam.
Astha’s student club, which had started with just 2 members grew of 20 members and by now become 2000!
They are trying to bring a change in the mindset – “Students should be judged on the basis of their capabilities, intelligence, and hard work, not based on their caste”.
Note: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to a person living or otherwise may be purely coincidental
