How enthusiastic were you to go to school in the mornings? Did you rush out the door, desperate to fill your head with another day’s knowledge? Or did you have to be dragged unwillingly from the warm cocoon of your bed, just to sit daydreaming at the back of class?

At the age of 14, Raju Chinthakayala was offered a choice most schoolboys wouldn’t have had to think twice about - whether to keep going to class. He had outgrown his local school, and there was nowhere nearby that taught beyond his age group, the 8th Standard. As far as his parents were concerned, he’d finished school. His father is a fisherman, and is illiterate having never been to school himself. His mother had finished education at 11. Raju, however, had other ideas.

“The nearest school that taught the 9th Standard was 8km away. I asked my mother for a bicycle so that I could go, but she told me we couldn’t afford it. I would have to walk if I wanted to continue my education, so that was my first challenge.”

It was a challenge that Raju rose to. “I got up at 6am and walked 16km every day for four years.” He laughs, “It was good exercise!”

“The nearest school that taught the 9th Standard was 8km away. I asked my mother for a bicycle so that I could go, but she told me we couldn’t afford it. I would have to walk if I wanted to continue my education…”

When he graduated from that school at 19, he set his sights on a degree - although the college was too far away even for him to walk. Fortunately, his parents understood how much his education meant to him. “My mother was able to give me 300Rs a month which covered my train fare and lunch.”

It was a loan that he would pay off many times over. When he graduated he went to work for an organisation which represents fisher folk like his father. “I was paid 4000Rs a month, so I was able to give 2000Rs to my family and save the remaining 2000Rs for myself. I still had my heart set on more education.”

“I want to change this system, it is treating humans like they are in the marketplace… I would rather be saving this money for my sister’s education than for her dowry.”

Raju worked there for two years, until he had saved enough money to apply for a Masters at the University in Vishakpatnam. “I got the First Rank on my entrance test and completed the two year postgraduate degree.”

It was this Masters in Social Work that helped Raju get his current job travelling to many of India’s states working with NGOs and other aid agencies. He earns 10,000Rs a month, but he never sees the majority of that money: “I send 7000Rs back to my family. I have a sister, and in our tradition it is required that we give a dowry for her. As her brother, it is my responsibility to save money for her marriage. We don’t know how much the dowry will be. I want to change this system, it is treating humans like they are in the marketplace, but it is a challenge to change it - I would rather be saving this money for my sister’s education than for her dowry.”

Now 26, he’s still just as dedicated to education, but these days his passion is ensuring that other children can benefit from school in the same way he has. He describes India itself as his classroom and library now: “You can learn everything from this country.”

Raju has worked in Andhra Pradesh, his home state, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Orissa. One of his first jobs was participating in the Social Audit in Rajasthan. This involved visiting communities to establish eligibility for state benefits such as the NREGA, which guarantees a minimum number of days employment to rural people. This was his first introduction to India’s tribal people.

His experiences in Jharkhand really opened his eyes to the problems tribes such as the Bondha and Santalis face. Raju is honest about how he felt as he travelled there: “Before I went, I had some doubts in my mind about the tribal people. The perception of the tribal people is that they don’t have any culture. That they live like animals in the forests and they don’t know how to treat other people.”

“I learnt so much from the tribal people. When I slept in their houses, we all slept under the mosquito net together – men, women, children and animals.”

He says that arriving in the tribal villages was a revelation: “I realised that they are more than culturally advanced, especially their way of treating children and other people and the way they distribute things equally. I learnt so much from the tribal people. When I slept in their houses, we all slept under the mosquito net together – men, women, children and animals! They gave the same priority to all of God’s creatures. In their mind, there isn’t any difference. They respect nature equally. I asked someone why they do that, and they told me ‘We don’t know where God is.’ He is in the animals, in the forest and in the water that quenches your thirst.”

Raju also noticed a more equal gender division of labour than he had experienced elsewhere in India: “The man would get up first thing in the morning and clean the whole house. He would clean all the utensils and do the housework. At that time I realised that they have a much more equal culture. There is no need to change them. If the government can give education, health and transport then that is a good thing, but instead the industrialisation of the country means that these people will lose their land. The tribal people are not hurting anyone. They know how to respect people. They know how to respect society. They know how to respect God’s creation. They don’t know how to exploit others. They don’t have any selfishness in their minds. Maybe that is the drawback for them!”

I ask him whether he thinks efforts such as his own to spread education and good health could inadvertently lead to the tribal way of life dying out. He said, “If tribal people get a good education, then they will have the knowledge to choose what is best for them. Maybe then they will want to change their lives in some positive manners. But right now, what they are being taught is how to be selfish.”

“We need a more equitable division of resources. We also need more rotation of politicians. In India, whoever is elected as an MP will still be elected for 30 or 40 years…”

Having lived through a period of rapid change in India, while experiencing many of its problems firsthand, I wonder what he thinks of economic growth: “The country is becoming richer and richer, but according to Arjun Singh’s report right now 70% of people have an income of less than 20Rs per day. If I have an illness in my leg, you cannot say that my whole body is healthy. Equal development is important. We have huge manpower and resources, but it is controlled by too few people.”

I ask Raju what he’d do if he somehow found himself as one of those people in control: “We need a more equitable division of resources. We also need more rotation of politicians. In India, whoever is elected as an MP will still be elected for 30 or 40 years. There is an election process, but whoever has power will be able to get themselves re-elected. There needs to be more opportunity to change who is in power. This requires that equitable division of resources and also a decentralisation of the decision-making process.”

He returns, finally, to the central importance of education: “Our education system is also very important, but we need to change the way we teach. There is too much spoon-feeding in schools and not enough thinking.”

Words and photos: Kevin E.G. Perry