By Tarushi Aswani / The Diplomat
On a scorching afternoon in Mishrikh, a remote village in northern India’s Uttar Pradesh state, children are gearing up to go to Ekal Vidyalaya. Most children who attend these schools wear tattered clothes and hand-me-down slippers, and carry half-broken and half-chewed pencils.
The school is part of the Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation (EVF), which claims that it aims to ensure children in rural India get access to education. These one-teacher schools are free and offer vocational classes alongside literacy to children aged five to 14 from any caste or religion.
However, the curriculum is firmly rooted in Hindu nationalism.
As children trail behind each other, they can be seen entering a local Hindu temple in their village, where they obediently sit on the floor, which exhales the heat of the sun. Facing a table with photos of Hindu deities neatly placed with the support of incense sticks, children focus all their attention toward the deities.
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