Once a dropout due to Covid-19, this Maharashtra SSC student is overcoming language barriers to prepare for board exams

Payal Varganti

With an aim to build a better future for herself, 14-year-old Payal Varganti is studying hard for the SSC board exam. The Maharashtra state board exam will begin on March 2. Payal is one of the many students whose education was affected due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

A resident of a small village in Solapur, located over 400 kilometres away from Mumbai, she had to migrate to Mumbai after her parents lost their daily earnings due to the pandemic-induced lockdown. Payal said her family shifted to Mumbai so that her father, who sold fish in the market, can start working again in order to get some income so she and her siblings can continue her studies.

As learning in classrooms was made digital during the pandemic, many students were not able to attend lectures due to a lack of technology including adequate number of mobile devices in their homes. In Payal's case, the family only had one mobile device that had to be shared among four siblings, one brother and three sisters, including the teenager. Due to this, the preference to attend online classes was always given to her younger brother and she along with her two sisters, missed out on attending classes most of the time.

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After missing out on school and a dropout gap of six months, Payal along with her family shifted to Mumbai when she was in Class 8. But the struggle for getting a good education did not stop. A social workers group from her community was running from pillar to post to secure admission in a Marathi-medium school for her near her house in Jogeshwari.

Speaking about her preparation for the SSC exam, Payal says, "I have to put extra effort to study as the way of teaching in Mumbai is way different than how the topics are taught in rural schools. Even if the subject is in English, in rural schools, the teachers explain the meaning in Marathi as it is easy for vernacular students to understand, but here in Mumbai schools, the English subject is taught in English language only."

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Since different regions in Maharashtra have different Marathi dialects, it has been a difficult road for Payal to understand the Marathi spoken in Mumbai.

Durga Gudilu, a social activist who helped Payal to secure admission and is helping her to prepare for SSC board exams, said, "Even if she is from Maharashtra and knows the Marathi language, Payal was looked at like a different student in the class among her other batchmates because of the Marathi dialect she speaks. This too impacted her learning."

"I am trying my best to overcome the language barriers and score good marks in the SSC exam," stated Payal, who has been completing her education with the help of a scholarship.