My mum as a gov. School teacher in TN went way beyond to literally "grab" the Nari kurvar( indeginous tribe) children to attend school or else they would go hunting/work with their family all day. My mum was linient with everything including the "uniforms"
Mostly they join school temporarily becuz, they're predominantly from a tribal community that migrates often. Mum convinces the parents that they'll provide mid day meals to the children for free. Uniforms usually will be out of stock when they join.
My mum broke every rule possible to KEEP the children in school, including the uniform rules, allowing students to join mid term.. sometimes only for week. Even if it meant that these children will only just be at the school for name sake for a week.
Nothing mattered more to my mum than getting education to this children. She did not once ask why the children had braided hair, it's sometimes custom for the male children to have braided hair like girls.
She Broke the uniform rules, she broke the hairstyle rules etc. Just so that these children will get to see the brighter side of education. No one EVER questioned my mum, for breaking these rules. Not the senior education officers, not the village leaders
No one ever asked why she was "partial" to these children, why rules are "mend" according to "THEIR CULTURE". She did it, and we knew why. Today I see muslim girls turn their back on schools. And it aches beyond words to see them go away. https://t.co/8a3a66SuxA
https://t.co/1cQtKU9kgy
Is this how Education institutions are going to work? Our education spaces exists as "secular" spaces in the sense they allow us to show the beautiful diversity in our society in these spaces.
An adivasi boy with braided hair, a Sikh child with turban, a Muslim girl with hijab, a hindu child with kungumam forehead showed up to school. This is how "uniformity" existed in my school... in my mum's schools.
We had "uniformity" in showing how different we were coming from different socio-cultural backgrounds. We had "uniformity" in bringing different lunch to school, "uniformity" in having different cultural traditions.
We saw how "uniformity" in our differences brought us "close together" than divide us. Today the amount of weaponization of "uniformity" to keep these diversity out of educational spaces is worrying.
Weaponising uniformity to make girls choose btw tradition and education is an ATTACK on the very womb of this motherland. A social evil to be uprooted. It's an equivalent of saying an afro American student to not BRAID their hair according to afro- American
Custom. Or else they won't be allowed to attend schools because it "violates" the uniform policy. To hell with the uniform policy! In the words of bharathiyar "destroy the type of world if a single person does not have access to food"
Similarly DESTROY th structures that keeps making children choose between education and traditions.. between diversity and uniformity. The only thing that should exist in "uniformity" everywhere is DIVERSITY!.
Today I stand in defiance to Rules, the power structures, EVERYTHING including religion, hate, bigotry that kept the muslim girls out of schools. Coming from LGBT+ community where my trans sisters and brothers were kept away from schools for the same..
Reason of "not wearing the appropriate uniform", I know the pain, i empathize with you. My heart bleeds as you ache seeing this. To the fathimas, to muskaans, to zoyas, to aishas i join your sadness from the community that shares the same scars as u do💔
To the honorable justices i have the words mahakavi bharathiyar for you:
நீயும் அறமும்
நிலத்திருத்தல் மெய்யானால்
ஓயுமுனர் எங்களுக்கிவ்
ஓர்வரம் நீ நல்குதியே🙏