She does not have facilities like an upper middle class family has. Her two-room small house in Somwari quarter has a small drawing room where, on one bed, her ill maternal aunt is lying with a little space remaining for others to use. With no spacious house, little amenities, how come this little girl studied hard and came out with flying colours in pre-upper primary school scholarship examination is a question that would come in everybody’s mind. One would ask as to what exactly would have encouraged the little girl to study and score above 90% marks (270 out of 300) in the scholarship examination. She stood first in Nagpur and 12th in the order of merit in Maharashtra. Her parents did not allow her to get into the ill-habit of mobile use nor they made her feel that there was anything less in her life as compared to her other friends. “I have the hobby of drawing and when I asked my father to get me the material for my hobby, he brought for me the costliest material worth Rs 1,000,” says Shravani Khobragade with a broad smile on her face. Shravani is a sixth class student in Pandit Bachharaj Vyas High School.

 

She appeared for a scholarship examination when she was in Class V, the results of which were declared recently. Her good score in scholarship examination did not affect her regular school examination where she equally scored above 90% marks. Shravani’s father Pramod is a contractual labourer, while mother Sneha does a job at a sewing machine centre. While father is Class X pass, mother is a graduate. “I never had to slap Shravani even once to get her to study. She likes to play and study, which she does as per mood but does regularly. We neither have fixed her timing of study nor of play. We both are least interested in watching TV. We both make limited use of mobile, which Shravani probably is emulating,” said Pramod Khobragade with confidence. Renuka Khalatkar, Supervisor of Pandit Bachharaj Vyas Vidyalaya, is more concerned about increasing awareness of scholarship examinations among parents. “In our region, parents are not aware of the examination.

 

Unlike in the past, scholarship examination nowadays is getting neglected and we don’t want that to happen,” expressed Khalatkar. Shrikant Agarkar, a teacher at Pandit Bachharaj School, who himself has passion due to which in whole State, maximum number of students of Bachharaj school are cracking scholarship examinations whether it is of fifth or of eighth. Normally, students come in the order of merit in fifth, but they fail to do so when they appear in scholarship at class 8. Agarkar is trying to break that jinx. This year, Sarthak Dokarmare of Bachharaj stood in the order of merit in Class 8 scholarship, who had achieved the feat when he was in Class 5. Most of the time, with education imparted through on-line mode, Agarkar preferred offline to check the ability of sitting students. Despite what school or parents do, the interest of children, their zeal is most important. Shravani has that interest. She never comes under pressure if it comes to study. She does it with full of enthusiasm. It is evident when one asks her where the 30 marks gone as she scored 270 out of 300 in her scholarship examination, she tells you the description of the subjects, in which and how much she failed to score. She doesn’t feel she has poor background because she has no time to think about it as she is engrossed in achieving her aim.

 

‘Scholarship exam is base for all competitive exams’ Shravani’s teacher Shrikant Agarkar had himself tried to get through competitive examination when he himself was in college. Now he is taking every single effort to get the students of school appear in scholarship examination and excel. “I feel scholarship examination is the base of several competitive examinations. This examination prepares the students from early childhood and then, they can face any examination with ease. Unfortunately, this examination is neglected by parents. I studied several aspects of why number of students of our region are less in number as compared to students in Western Maharashtra. When it comes to achieving success in Civil Services examination, I found they take scholarship examinations more seriously than we take. If parents of this region become aware of scholarship examination, our number in civil services would definitely rise,” asserted Agarkar.