By Mumtaz Alam Falahi, TwoCircles.net,
New Delhi: It was a cold January in Delhi when the hot blood in then 28-year-old Shams Alam stirred to do something for society. Being an MNC employee, Azamgarh-native and Delhi-based Alam found little time for social cause. He and one of his friends sat and thought about taking an initiative. Pahel was the result. They formed the NGO and started devoting their weekends to bring dropouts back to school. Mumtaz Alam Falahi of TwoCircles.net has talked to Shams Alam in his Jamia Nagar office of Pahel.
“Pahel is a non-profit organization. The idea came when I and one of my friends thought about doing some social work. We were working in an MNC, there was so much workload that we had little time for social work. So to engage ourselves in social life at weekends at least, we started this NGO in January 2006,” says Alam. After some time he left the job at the MNC and opened a travel agency as his main business and gave all time after business to the NGO.
The NGO is not working on any government projects because “we are unable to pay 20-30% as commission to officers in advance,” says Alam whose area of social activity has now been both Delhi and his hometown Azamgarh which though his family left more than 20 years ago.
“We are focusing on government schools where dropout rate is higher as teachers there pay little attention to the requirements of students. Besides, government is unable to provide books to students in time and teaching aids to teachers. When students stop going school, teachers do little to take them along as they do not see any commercial benefit,” Alam says.
“We have adopted a Municipal Corporation of Delhi school in Jamia Nagar area in New Delhi. That school runs in four shifts: morning, evening, Hindi medium and Urdu medium. So far we have been able to catch 40 dropouts and bring them back to the school,” proudly says Alam.
Expanding his work area, he has also held some career counseling camps in Azamgarh. But after the stigma of terror, the town, particularly its Muslim residents are frightened about further education of their wards. “We held a career counseling camp four months ago in Azamgarh city. The problem there is there is no scope for higher education in the town as there are not many colleges. However, while counseling we faced another problem: the parents were frightened. They do not want to send their wards outside for further education. They want to educate them but do not want to send them out of Azamgarh, given the situation in the last two years when scores of youths from the town were picked in terror cases.”
Shams Alam, president, Pahel NGO, in his office
Alam himself is unable to understand why his Azamgarh was termed as Atankgarh. “There is no separation issue in Azamgarh, there has not been any riot in the district and there was no such activity which could promote terrorism. The whole drama is a politically motivated conspiracy to malign the town and to demoralize the Muslims who were progressing both in economy and education.”
Alam’s is a typical case highlighting the urge among Azmis for higher education of their sons and daughters, which has come with affluence.
Alam’s father is class VIII pass-out and mother could not read beyond Maktab but they made their children graduate. Alam, his two brothers and one sister are graduates and settled. Alam could read up to Class III in a madrasa in Azamgarh, then he studied till Class IX in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia where his parents were. His father had a business there. Afterward, Alam did his matriculation and +2 and graduation from Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi.
Though migration has brought affluence to Azmis, Alam, now 32, has a different thought and some high dreams. He wants to do something for his hometown at larger scale. He wants that Azamgarh natives are not forced to leave town for job, education or health.
Link:
http://www.pahel.org/