Small hands big heart

The pandemic has uprooted lives. Among the worst hit are kids from needy homes, many of whom are being forced to abandon studies and work, or juggle the two. Anindya Chattopadhyay on childhoods interrupted -
Bhumika’s learning to ignore things. Like, the din of Delhi’s traffic and her family’s poverty. Clad in jeans and a striped T-shirt, the 15-year-old sits cross-legged on the pavement at the crossing of KG Marg and Connaught Place, poring over her science book, looking up only when a bird feeder stops by to buy grain. The student of Sarvodaya Kanya Govt School, Peeragarhi, has just started online school for class 10.
“My elder sister Puja, who’s just got a job at a shoe factory, is the only earning member,” says Bhumika whose other sister Pratigya also studies in class X. Bhumika and her mother Chandadevi try to bring some income too by selling bird feed.
Ask the girl about her dad, and she ducks the topic. She even refuses to share her surname, choosing instead to talk about her ambition in life. “I want to be a policewali,” says Bhumika who shares the only smartphone at home with her other school-going sibling.
Sharing and adjusting are qualities the pandemic has taught Bhumika. “But things will improve soon,” she says, sitting at the busy junction. A hopeful teenager at the crossroads –– in more ways than one.