In This Year's IIT Class, Kids Of Farmers And Labourers: Telangana's Super 100, Almost

Hyderabad: Marginal farmers, labourers, orphans, Dalits and tribals - nearly a hundred children from very underprivileged backgrounds have made Telangana proud this year. With special coaching from free government schools, 27 of them have cracked the entrance examination for the prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology. The other 71 will go to the National Institutes of Technology.

NDTV met the teens on Tuesday, most wore shy smiles, a sparkle of hope and confidence in the eyes. They have dreams bigger than making it to the IIT. 

"I want to crack the civil services and become tribal affairs secretary in the government one day," said Chandu Naik, the son of a marginal farmer from Nalgonda. He says since Class 7, he had dreamed of getting into the IIT. 

"Many of our civil service aspirants are from IIT and NIT. So I decided to achieve an IIT. For my family, just my getting a government job would have been a dream," he said.

Chandu is inspired by Dr RS Praveen Kumar, a doctor-turned-IPS officer who has been managing the affairs of Telangana's massive social welfare residential hostel and schools programme as its secretary for some years. They have emerged as centres of excellence. Taking that forward, the officer incharge introduced specialised coaching to tribal and dalit children for admission to engineering, medicine, law schools and the other best institutions of higher education so they can compete with their more privileged peers. 

Bhanu Sunil Kumar from Warangal has similar ambitions. 

"My father could not study and because of ill-health, he could not get a job. So he dreamed that I should study. He wanted me to go into civil services. So I will go to IIT and also prepare for civil service entrance exams at the same time."

Ketavat Bhupya Naik said his passion is physics and he hopes to study mechanical engineering. "I want to be a scientist. I want to innovate, so that we can save fuels that are burnt up by vehicles," he said.

Dr Kumar gives full credit to the dedication and hard work put in by the students and teachers. "It is making history," he said. 

Telangana, he said, is investing heavily in residential education, where the poorest of the poor students are being given the best possible education. 

"These children are icons of society and the state. Their backgrounds are unimaginable. Their success is fantastic," he said.