Cuttack: It is often said that if there is a will, there is a way. If a person has strong determination, he can defeat all adverse conditions. This has come true for a boy from Bhuban area in Dhenkanal district, who secured 80.5 per cent mark in this year’s High School Certificate (HSC) examination despite facing many difficulties in his life.
Amarjeet Mishra had lost his father Raghunath in a road accident while he was in Class VII. The young boy’s mother and other senior members of his family were imprisoned in connection with a dowry torture case when he entered Class VIII, sources said.
These two unfortunate incidents, however, did not deter Amarjeet from continuing his study. Around this time, an Athagarh-based voluntary organisation, John Augustus Prison and Social Welfare Services, extended a helping hand to Amarjeet. The voluntary orgnisation’s secretary, Pranakrushna Choudhury, provided textbooks and other study materials to the minor boy. Choudhury had also donated money to Amarjeet to pay for his examination fees at Tapobana High School near Bhuban.
The boy appeared for this year’s HSC examination, conducted by the Board of Secondary Education (BSE), Orissa, without taking private tuition.
“Amarjeet’s success has made us proud. This year, we have provided assistance to a total of 1,865 school students whose parents or guardians are in prison,” said Choudhury, a former jail welfare officer.
Choudhury claimed that he had seen many boys and girls discontinuing their studies after the imprisonment of their parents or guardians. “During my tenure as a jail official, I had seen many prisoners’ children entering the crime world. After my retirement, I had decided to set up a voluntary organisation to assist prisoners’ children in their studies,” he said.
Choudhury and his wife Basanti Jena, a former high school teacher, had established the voluntary organisation at Radhanathpur Shasan near Athagarh in 2003 by investing all the money they had got at the time of their retirement. “Former Director General of Police Amiya Bhushan Tripathy, retired Income Tax officer Gopal Prasad Nanda and private corporate official Nabaghan Pani had helped us a lot in our endeavour. IAS officer Girish SN usually donates money to prisoners’ children for filling their forms for annual HSC examination,” said Choudhury.
According to him, office-bearers of John Augustus Prison and Social Welfare Services have planned to extend assistances to prisoners’ kin who are pursuing their college studies. “We have planned to create a corpus fund for the purpose. Nanda has donated Rs 1.5 lakh for this purpose,” Choudhury said.
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