They lost their favourite school and beloved friends. As they soldier on, Malin’s children struggle to come to terms with concept of death and destruction
Every Sunday and on school holidays, Rahul Lambe (11), Akshay Limbe (14) and his brother Avinash (12) trek 2 km from Chinchodi village, where they now live, to Malin, where they used to live till two years ago.
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They search in the mud and dig in the debris shouting the names of their two friends and classmates — Hemant Zanjare and his brother Amit — who are among the 100-odd villagers whose bodies were never found after a landslide on July 30, 2014, wiped out the village, killing 151, including 23 children. Rahul, Akshay and Avinash are among those children who were rescued from under the debris. “I was in Std V when it happened,” recalls Akshay. “The landslide not only destroyed our school, but also took away Hemant and Amit. They were never found. We come here on Sundays and dig under the debris to search for our friends. God cannot be so brutal.”
(From left) Avinash, Rahul and Akshay sit outside their old school
Akshay and his friends also miss their old school, which they say was a pleasant place with a big playground. “The school we go to now is not a good school,” says Akshay. “It is a congested room and we have to sit on the floor.”
The current school is at Malin Phata, close to the temporary shelter
The rundown old school is one of the 13 structures that managed to partially survive the landslide. The zilla parishad school was the only school in the vicinity, catering to seven villages in the neighbourhood. With the Geological Survey of India declaring the area risky, villagers use whatever remains of the school to house their cattle. The students make do with a temporary two-room ‘school’ built by a non-governmental organisation. This is in nothing like the ZP school, which was beginning to see improvement just before the landslide.
“Just before the landslide, our school got big donations to begin e-learning and computer training,” says Rahul. “For a year after the incident, there was no school. We were promoted directly to the next class.”
The current school is at Malin Phata, close to the temporary shelter allotted to the villagers. It is a concrete structure, but does not have any facilities. Seventy-one students of various ages from Adiware, Panchale, Vachape, Amade and Malin are taught here.
“I miss my home in the vicinity and my earlier school,” says Pratik Zanjare, another child rescued from the landslide. “Earlier, we used to get up early in the morning when people would be ringing bells in the Maruti temple near the school. There used to be fairs and bullock cart races. Now we do not have anything. School is just for two to three hours and then we go back home. We don’t even play anymore. Earlier, we used to play hide and seek after school. But now, parents are worried that we will get lost or something bad will happen to us.”
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