It takes a certain thoughtfulness to not miss the resemblance of a scalloped leaf with an imaginative form of human heart and also name it Lokesh. If you read the full story, accompanied with doodles by Neeru, a seven-year-old from Patan, a village of 400 families in Rajasthan, you will learn about her sensibilities. A story like “Dukhi Ped” written by the children of a nearby village, Rampura, got us thinking when we learnt about the misery of a thirsty tree which was nourished by schoolgoing children. We were told later that it was a true story. A thirsty tree in the midst of scorching Rajasthan.
An inventive mind like that does not come with six hours of schooling every day or even reading the most celebrated literature. Sometimes, it is the unavailability of a standard that adds to one’s experience and understanding of things, as seen in the drawings made by the young kids living in villages as part of the library programme of an NGO, Organisation for Early Literacy Promotion (OELP) in seven villages of Rajasthan.
