Entrance test on Sunday to offer them a ticket out of poverty.
Summer vacations can wait. Habibur Rahman is up to his elbows in mathematics and physics problems. The 16-year-old student of Urdu-medium Tahzeeb High School in Malegaon is hoping an examination on Sunday will offer him — as well as his family — the ticket out of poverty.
Salman Bari, the son of a priest and a Kendriya Vidyalaya student at Solapur, has similar aspirations.
Rahman and Bari are among the 150 poor Muslim boys from Maharashtra who will have a go at the entrance test of Patna-based IIT-joint entrance examination (JEE) preparatory centre ‘Rahmani 30’. It picks the best 30 brains from the underprivileged Muslim community and provides them free coaching to crack the IIT-JEE. No girls are allowed to sit the test, though.
The three-hour examination, conducted across 56 centres across India will test candidates’ skills in physics, chemistry and mathematics.
But acing the test is no cakewalk. Over 14,000 students from nine states will compete for 30 seats. Those selected will face a rigorous two-year coaching for the JEE and Class XII.
Rahmani 30 was the brain child of Abhayanand, director general of police, Bihar, who not only mentors students but also teaches physics on weekends and holidays.
Rahmani 30 has scripted success stories over the years. When it was up in 2009, all of its then 10 students cleared the JEE. The next year, four of 12 students cracked it. Last year, seven of 30 students got into IITs.
But Maharashtra hasn’t fared as well. Last year, not one student from the state managed to get into the Rahmani 30 league. In 2011, only one candidate cleared the test. Ditto in 2010, when only Yazeed Bashamakh, the son of a TV mechanic in Aurangabad, got in and later made it to the IIT in 2012.
Shakir Shaikh, a teacher at a Malegaon school, says students from the state lose out because the state board syllabus is not up to scratch. “The revision of the class X curriculum is mainly cosmetic. The syllabi of primary- and upper-primary levels should have been revised first.”
@kanchanDNA
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}