The man behind the one rupee school

140 students are enrolled at his school – Babul Ilm – in Haripur

ISLAMABAD:

Zahid Kazmi, 44, has been focusing on two tasks; one has become his hobby and the other his mission. The hobby is to collect, donate and give books for reading, attracting more people to read books, meeting authors and maintaining regular contact with them. He has collected 35,000 books over a period of 20 years.

Among books, he is not just fond of collecting autobiographies but has the largest collection of Urdu autobiographies in Pakistan, numbering over 1,000. Also, he has 500 autobiographies of famous Pakistani personalities in English language. He not only asks people to write their biographies but also promises to publish them. “Dozens of people have written MPhil and PhD dissertations using my collections,” he says.

The second task – his mission – is to educate the children of the most economically disadvantaged people. He feels that education these days requires school fees, uniforms, shoes, bags, stationary among other miscellaneous accessories that the low-income people can hardly afford as their prime focus is putting food on the table.

Taking up the task of educating the children of the low-income people, Kazmi set up a school in his hometown Bareela, a village surrounded by several small villages scattered on or at the foot of small but lush green mountains with a total population of more than 15,000, in Haripur four years ago.

Keeping in mind that these villages are home to low-income people, his first task was to persuade people to teach their children and he did it by taking up the responsibility of bearing all kinds of educational expenses. He succeeded in enrolling 50 children. “These were the children whose families have not been to any educational institution for decades,” he said.

“If you really want to do it; just start teaching under a tree,” Kazmi quoted a friend as saying when he was thinking about renting a proper building for the school as a first step. “I understood his point that education was more important than the building; I rented a room in the village and started teaching,” he said, adding that roughly 140 students were now enrolled at his school – Babul Ilm – in a five-room building with open space spreading over 1.5 kanals. The school has a total staff of nine people; six teachers, a female helper, a security guard and a volunteer.

Of the total 140 students, Kazmi revealed that just over 100 children have already been sponsored by people who wish to see a change in the society through education. The school provides books, clothes and transportation to these children, he said, admitting that the promise to provide food has yet to be fulfilled as the total cost of a student is around Rs3,000 making it roughly Rs35,000 per year.

Kazmi said that the school charges fee of just one rupee – US$0.0060 – to preserve the parents as wells as the children’s dignity and self-esteem and to give a clear message that they should not be looked upon as charity cases in a country where the schools’ first and foremost concern is fee even during the coronavirus pandemic. “There is nothing in human life that makes more difference than education,” he believes.

Some of the expenses of the project are borne by Kazmi himself, some by his friends, philanthropists and overseas Pakistanis. “My friends are my assets. Personally, I’m a resourceless person but I have many great friends,” Kazmi said.

The quest was to offer unconditional education to the downtrodden, Kazmi said, adding that the fundamental purpose behind the school was to introduce the children to education. Since schools are closed because of the pandemic, he said, the staff has provided syllabus to children at home. 

Reminiscing about his personal library, Kazmi said he had started with just one book, a few newspapers and magazines some 20 years ago. “Now, people from other cities also come, especially for the collection of autobiographies that I have,” he said. Besides autobiographies, he takes interest in politics, history and satire as well as humour.

“The school and library have no religion and I have no interest in any caste, colour, race or profession,” Kazmi concluded, adding that he was now focusing on equipping children with some technical skills as well.