Burkha-clad girl - Not very different is the case of S. Syed Ali Fathima, a 17-year-old Burkha-clad Muslim girl of Othakadai here. With a cut-off mark of 197 out of 200, she stands a fair chance of getting a medical seat under government quota through 3.5 per cent reservations provided for Backward Class-Muslims. However, the girl is in no mood to celebrate as her good score has only increased the anxiety regarding future expenses for her studies. Daughter of a cattle feed seller, the girl has excelled after faced many a humiliation for not paying her school fees in time, her inability to spend for transportation and so on. Her elder sister too scored 1,033 out of 1,200 marks in the Plus Two examinations a few years ago. But could not join an engineering course for want of money and ended up pursuing a bachelor’s degree in mathematics. The two girls studied with the financial assistance from their maternal uncle M. Jahir Hussain, himself a father of three girls, who struggles to make ends meet with the paltry income from his textile business. Ms. Fathima’s mother S. Mahabu Beevi (51), a school dropout, says: “My father, a tea shop owner at Thumbaipatti in Melur, did not educate me. But I do not want that to happen to my daughters. The education my children receive at schools and colleges is for worldly life and the religious education that I impart to them at home is for life after death. I am confident Allah will show us the way forward.”
Posted on: Sat, 29 Jun 2013 09:34:23 +0000
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