“I also want to go to school; can I go to school too?” Arvan said, with a voice too confident and words too fragile to enunciate the sentences. He kept reverberating these them until he grew older, eligible to attend school. That dream, however, came against the backdrop of a devastating loss in his family.
His father, Junaid, along with his nephew Nasir, was lynched to death by cow vigilantism on February 15, 2023, on suspicion of cow smuggling. As per some media reports, the duo was burnt alive. Later on days ahead of the incident on February 16, their charred remains were discovered inside a burnt vehicle in the Bhiwani district, Haryana. Their bodies were severely mutilated and charred beyond recognition, resulting in their gravestone reading the same name, “Nasir and Junaid.”
Nasir left behind a sorrow-stricken wife and an adopted daughter, while the death of Junaid was lamented by a wife, three sons, and two daughters. Their elder daughter, Parwana, could not bear the loss of a father, fell ill, and subsequently lost her life in May 2023.
The house of Junaid was engulfed by the inferno of two major losses, and its burns lingered in the lives of the family members, predominantly on Arvan. Time moved, but the life of Arvan remained marooned in the yearnings for his father and sister. His mother, Sajida, watched him grow increasingly withdrawn and unhappy, carrying her own sorrow after already losing a daughter in the aftermath of Junaid’s death.
However, the word “school” became one of the few things that continued to excite Arvan during his childhood. Wearing a school uniform was his long-held desire, and when he finally put one on, it brought him palpable happiness. It was something closely tied to the dreams his father once had for him.
The Shaagrid Foundation was already in contact with Arvan’s family in the course of his elder brother’s education and Arvan’s innocence was rekindled by the appearance of Shaagird’s team time and again in his house. Every time the team visits, Aravn is found reiterating the idea of joining school. “I also want to go to school with my brothers; I also want to study,” he was found saying until the day came.
As soon as his age qualified for admission enrollment, the Shaagird Foundation enrolled him in the same school where his brothers go, Meer Public School. The place that has instilled confidence in Arvan’s brothers. The place that has transformed them. The same place now lay ahead of Arvan, waiting for him to recapture his lost happiness and etch a way for a bright future.
While walking in the aisle of Meer Public School, his laughter mounts above his cries. The cries of losing a father. The cries of crumbling love. Yet, within the corridors of the school he longed for, Arvan now walks toward a future his father once dreamed of for him.
