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India's 75th Independence Day: Dubai student gifts library to village

Dubai - The Year 3 student, with the help of friends, will be launching a library comprising 200 books in Karaikudi.

Isha Rajeev Nair, a year 3 student of Kings School Nad Al Sheba, with the generous contributions of her friends in the UAE, will be launching a library comprising 200 books – sanitised and shipped from Dubai – at a small school in a village in Karaikudi in the state of Tamil Nadu

A highly motivated child with a determination to contribute to social causes, Isha holds child education and continuity of education close to her heart.

It all started during the pandemic in 2020 when schools were forced to adopt e-learning. Isha took up the initiative to help the less fortunate children in India whose education had been disrupted. She started conducting online e-learning sessions where she read stories and poetry to them.

Speaking to Khaleej Times, her father Rajeev Nair said: “With the help of an NGO based in India, Storytime, Isha reached out to a needy school and started an initiative titled ‘From One Child to Another Child– Every Book Matters’. Through this initiative, pre-loved story books for children in the age group 4 to 14 were collected, sanitised and shipped to India where a library is currently being set up in the school in Karaikudi. Till date over 200 books have been collected and sent to the school. The library will be officially launched at this remote school on Indian independence day.”

Nair added that help for this library project came in from many quarters – with the biggest support coming from the students and parents of Kings School Nad Al Sheba. As word spread, Isha started receiving books from children in the Mudon community, where she lives, as well as others.

“Even before the pandemic, Isha used to host reading sessions for younger students and also help her peers. But when the pandemic struck, she decided to help those hit most badly – the underprivileged students in India. She began teaching them English online by reading stories out to them and explaining it to them in their local language Tamil, which also happens to be Isha’s mother tongue,” Nair said.

Inspired by the success of this pilot project, Isha has now undertaken consecutive donation drives to help set up libraries in schools in rural and remote villages in Darjeeling and Assam in India. She is organising to send around 500 books to these libraries which will be transported to their doorsteps by a rickshaw that she is arranging to buy by raising funds online through various legal platforms.

Talking about her love for reading, Isha said: “ I have been an avid reader from a very young age and the very thought of not being able to read or have access to books was very disturbing. Further I am inspired by our beloved ruler, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, who once said: ‘Help youngsters to read as it is a key to promote the development of nations. The love of reading is taught from an early age and becomes a habit and culture that you cannot live without.’

Isha, incidentally has read all books authored by Sheikh Mohammed.

Her father Rajeev Nair said: “Charity begins at home. She sees me and her mother stay involved in a lot of community activities. We have always given a lot of importance to education, and she is also very socially aware of the fact that education can bring about a positive change in people’s lives.”

saman@khaleejtimes.com