I (Krishnan) have been witness to an exhilarating experience….

On Monday the 21^st of November, Arvind from Varuna Logistics, and I went to meet eight girl students of Udayan Care at their office in Delhi. We went to meet with these students as part of our program, “Kanya, Sky is not the Limit”, a comprehensive scholarship sponsored by Varuna Logistics. The program takes a holistic approach towards the education of girl students (beyond the 6^th std), by supporting them comprehensively to reach their potential.

The purpose of our meeting was to interact and understand as to what they are up to and what they would like to pursue as a career and further education. We went with an open mind and asked them open ended questions. The answers from each one of the eight students whom we met just blew us away. They all were amazing, touching and insightful too.

Mind you, all these eight girls are orphaned and a good number of them were abandoned too while being very young. Some of them have siblings who are special children and need to be taken care of and others have the responsibility to get their siblings educated too.

Now, when you think of an orphaned and abandoned girl child, what would you expect her to know about her education, career, money, aspirations, ambitions, future and life. Especially given her context, very little of course, isn’t it? But Arvind and I were surprised. Completely. We were in fact bowled over by many of their clear answers in terms of where they are, where they wish to be, how they would like to reach there, and most importantly, how they would like to give back to the society.

The very first girl whom we met, Lakshmi (name changed), when asked what she wanted to do, she answered that while she was not absolutely clear about what she wanted to do but was completely clear about what she did not want to do. She loves history and travel and would ideally like to pursue a career that combines both, and would love to learn for the rest of her life. Lakshmi never liked subjects like science, maths or commerce and loved history. She has accompanied some of the international interns of Udayan Care to historical monuments around Delhi, explaining to them the significance of the monuments. Lakshmi has the advantage of being fluent in English, and Hindi of course. Her question to us was whether we would support her to do her Masters despite not pursuing what most students generally do like enginnering or management or medicine.

Soul touching was our interaction with Elizabeth (again name changed) who not only has to take care of herself but also has to manage her elder sister who is a special child. Elizabeth works in a company and stays in a rented accommodation even as her elder sister with special needs is taken care of by someone in some other city. She wants to do her NIFT Program and would one day launch her own boutique business.

The underlying characteristics of all the eight orphaned girl students whom we met were, confidence, clarity, clear communication in English and Hindi, caring and responsible for their siblings, and a conviction to give back to the society at the first opportunity. All of them have got their education from the best of the schools in Delhi NCR such as DPS, Sanskriti and the like. Not even for a moment you would feel that any of them has come from a disadvantageous background.

Arvind and I shared our honest thoughts with the group, with a sincere and honest admiration and appreciation for each one of them. At their age, we were nowhere near this group of girls in terms of what we wanted to do and where we wanted to go.

A very special thanks to Dr Kiran Modi, the founder of Udayan Care and her committed team who have left no stone unturned to transform these girls from where they came, to whatever they are today. The efforts of, and initiatives taken by Dr Modi and her team are very obvious in every single girl whom we met.

What a way to start our work week…insightful and perspective changing.