Learning the alphabet

Medhi realised how important it was to be literate when she was elected secretary of a local mahila samiti in 1988. I was made secretary of this 21-member weavers group though there were several other literate members, she says. But when the government sent us a cheque of Rs 7,500,I was in a terrible fix. First,some people tried to rob us of the money by trying to encash it without our knowledge. And when we finally recovered it and went to encash it,the bank refused to give it because I could not read or write.

Luckily,the manager of the bank was helpful. A young man at the bank,Premeswar Deka,made me write my name several hundred times and the manager taught me how to operate the bank account, recalls Medhi.

1n 1989,when the local development block organised a workshop for women weavers of the area,Rangila was in trouble again. They gave each of us a pen and a notepad and asked us to take down notes. All I could do was shut my eyes and pray to god,hoping he would help me memorise what the trainers told us. The signature that I managed to scribble meant nothing much because that was the only thing I could write, she says.

Medhi,however,doesnt blame her parents for not sending her to school. My parents thought girls were meant to be married off,so why send them to school. But I dont blame them; they never went to school themselves, she says.

Medhi says that though her father Salisa Medhi was illiterate,it was he,and not any of the other literate villagers,who came forward to donate his one-and-a-half katha of land to set up a primary school in the village. He was poor and illiterate. But that did not deter him from donating land for the school, says Medhi.

The late beginning only made Medhi fiercely determined. So,six months after Gyan Vigyan Samitis literacy mission reached her village,Medhi took the world of letters. It was like coming out of a deep dark hole into a world full of light. Now I can not only read and write,I also write poems and stories, she says.

Medhis first collection of poemsPachowa meaning Westerlieswas published in 1999 by the State Resource Centre,Assam. The book has 20 poems in Assamese,all printed in her own handwriting. It is not an ordinary book. It is the story of how literacy can change lives, says Debadutta Barkataki,director of the State Resource Centre.

Literacy has not made me rich. I still work as a daily-wage labourer,apart from helping my brothers family by weaving clothes and rearing goats and ducks, says Medhi,who lives with one of her four brothers. She also works with Gyan Vigyan Samitis literacy programme.

The local panchayat also takes Medhis help to implement some of its programmes. Medhis services are particularly important when we call our panchayat meeting every three months. She is a wonderful speaker and when she says something,everybody is easily convinced, says Manomati Deka,president of the Devananda panchayat.

While the literacy movement helped her read and write Assamese,Rangila picked up Hindi when her niece Labhita entered high school seven years ago. Now pehi Assamese for aunt teaches Hindi to my younger brother Biswa who has just entered high school, says Labhita. Biswa chips in: Pehi has also started writing poems in Hindi now.