Blind boy robbed of stick, money for books
PRASUN BHATTACHARYA
Tarak Chandra: Harrowing tale. Picture by Sanjoy
Chattopadhyaya
A blind boy from a poor family, who cleared his Madhyamik,
had
collected Rs 130 with great difficulty and was coming to
Calcutta to buy books for the Higher Secondary course he had
just enrolled in.
He dozed off on a Sealdah-bound local train on Friday
morning.
When he woke up, he found not just his money, but also his
walking stick missing.
Nineteen-year-old Tarak Chandra had been robbed of his dire
need - the stick, without which he could barely stumble along
- and his dream - the Rs 130, without which he could not take
the first steps towards becoming a teacher and helping blind
boys and girls.
He broke down on reaching Sealdah station.
Seeing him weeping, a Samaritan stepped up to hold his hand
and set off a chain of events that finally saw the blind boy
returning home safe, with the books he was so desperately
seeking.
Tarak, a resident of Guma, in North 24-Parganas, and a
student
of arts at Habra High School, left home early on Friday. He
was headed for the language academy of Lok Siksha Parishad,
at
Narendrapur, to buy his books.
Having lost his father early, Tarak's only source of support
is his mother, who earns Rs 300 a month working as a cook for
a family in their neighbourhood.
"I dozed off on a Bongaon local on my way to Sealdah," Tarak
recalled. "Suddenly, I woke up and found my walking stick,
that was lying on my lap, and the money in my shirt pocket
missing. I can't walk without the stick. Helped by a man, I
managed to reach the crowded taxi stand at Sealdah, but
failed
to move any further."
It was at the taxi stand that Basudev Sadhukhan, a resident
of
Tollygunge, saw Tarak weeping and went up to him. "He was
looking devastated. I had to help him," Sadhukhan later said.
He took Tarak to Lighthouse for the Blind, a school on SP
Mukherjee Road in the Tollygunge area, from where Tarak had
appeared for his Madhyamik. "I decided to go to my school and
seek help from my former teachers. But, unfortunately, no one
was there," Tarak said.
Sadhukhan then took him to Tollygunge police station, nearby.
"When he was brought here, he was shivering and crying," said
sub-inspector Subhojit Sen. Sen contacted NGO Hive India,
which took the boy to its office, bought him the books and
cassettes he needed, and dropped him home.
"I thank all those who helped me when I had given up hope,"
said Tarak.
Source The Telegraph July 8th
To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject unsubscribe.
To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please
visit the list home page at
http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in
