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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Maulana’s 'gullak' initiative touches 60K students

Read & Lead Foundation President Maulana Abdul Qayyum Mirza with daughter Mariyam Mirza. Mumbai/Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: In the new age controlled by smart-gadgets and social media, an academic from Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar has sparked a small, head-turning and successful - ‘savings and reading’ revolution among middle-school children. Launched in 2006, by Maulana Abdul Qayyum Mirza, the humble initiative turns 20 this year and witnessed over 60,000 free savings boxes (gullaks)...

Maulana’s 'gullak' initiative touches 60K students

Read & Lead Foundation President Maulana Abdul Qayyum Mirza with daughter Mariyam Mirza. Mumbai/Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: In the new age controlled by smart-gadgets and social media, an academic from Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar has sparked a small, head-turning and successful - ‘savings and reading’ revolution among middle-school children. Launched in 2006, by Maulana Abdul Qayyum Mirza, the humble initiative turns 20 this year and witnessed over 60,000 free savings boxes (gullaks) distributed to Class V-VIII students in 52 government and private schools. “The aim was to inculcate a love for ‘saving and reading’ among young children. We started by presenting small plastic ‘gullaks’ (savings boxes) at the Iqra Boys & Girls High School, and later to many other schools,” Mirza said with a tinge of satisfaction. Scoffed by sceptics, it soon caught the eyes of the schools and parents who loved the idea that kept the kids off mischief, but gave them the joy of quietly slipping Re. 1 or even Rs. 5 save from their daily pocket money into the ‘gullak’. “That tiny ‘gullak’ costing barely Rs 3-Rs 5, becomes almost like their personal tiny bank which they guard fiercely and nobody dares touch it. At the right time they spend the accumulated savings to buy books of their choice – with no questions asked. Isn’t it better than wasting it on toys or sweets or amusement,” chuckled Mirza. A childhood bookworm himself, Mirza, now 50, remembers how he dipped into his school’s ‘Book Box’ to avail books of his choice and read them along with the regular syllabus. “Reading became my passion, not shared by many then or even now… Sadly, in the current era, reading and saving are dying habits. I am trying to revive them for the good of the people and country,” Maulana Mirza told The Perfect Voice. After graduation, Mirza was jobless for sometime, and decided to make his passion as a profession – he took books in a barter deal from the renowned Nagpur philanthropist, Padma Bhushan Maulana Abdul Karim Parekh, lugged them on a bicycle to hawk outside mosques and dargahs. He not only sold the entire stock worth Rs 3000 quickly, but asked astonished Parekh for more – and that set the ball rolling in a big way, ultimately emboldening him to launch the NGO, ‘Read & Lead Foundation’ (2018). “However, despite severe resources and manpower crunch, we try to cater to the maximum number of students, even outside the district,” smiled Mirza. The RLF is also supported by his daughter Mariyam Mirza’s Covid-19 pandemic scheme, ‘Mohalla Library Movement’ that catapulted to global fame, and yesterday (Oct. 20), the BBC telecast a program featuring her. The father-daughter duo urged children to shun mobiles, video-games, television or social media and make ‘books as their best friends’, which would always help in life, as they aim to gift 1-lakh students with ‘gullaks’ in the next couple of years. At varied intervals Mirza organizes small school book fairs where the excited kids troop in, their pockets bulging with their own savings, and they proudly purchase books of their choice in Marathi, English, Hindi or Urdu to satiate their intellectual hunger. Fortunately, the teachers and parents support the kids’ ‘responsible spending’, for they no longer waste hours before screens but attentively flip pages of their favourite books, as Mirza and others solicit support for the cause from UNICEF, UNESCO, and global NGOs/Foundations. RLF’s real-life savers: Readers UNICEF’s Jharkhand District Coordinator and ex-TISS alumnus Abul Hasan Ali is full of gratitude for the ‘gullak’ habit he inculcated years ago, while Naregaon Municipal High School students Lakhan Devdas (Class 6) and Sania Youssef (Class 8) say they happily saved most of their pocket or festival money to splurge on their favourite books...! Zilla Parishad Girls Primary School (Aurangpura) teacher Jyoti Pawar said the RLF has proved to be a “simple, heartwarming yet effective way” to habituate kids to both reading and savings at a tender age, while a parent Krishna Shinde said it has “changed the whole attitude of children”. “We encourage books of general interest only, including inspiring stories of youth icons like Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai (28) and environmentalist Greta Thunberg (23) which fascinates our students, and other popular children’s literature,” smiled Mirza. The Maulana’s RLF, which has opened three dozen libraries in 7 years, acknowledges that every coin dropped into the small savings boxes begins a new chapter – and turns into an investment in knowledge that keeps growing.

Ready to help, PM Modi tells Myanmar's Senior General as his country recovers from earthquake

  • PTI
  • Apr 4
  • 2 min read

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BANGKOK: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday told Myanmar’s Senior General Min Aung Hlaing that India was doing everything possible to assist the nation in recovering from the aftermath of a massive earthquake that killed several thousand.


Modi met Senior General Min, the head of Myanmar’s military government, on the sidelines of the summit meeting of the leaders of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral and Technical Cooperation (BIMSTEC) grouping.


“Met Senior General Min Aung Hlaing of Myanmar on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC Summit in Bangkok. Once again expressed condolences on the loss of lives and damage to property in the wake of the recent earthquake. India is doing whatever is possible to assist our sisters and brothers of Myanmar in this critical time,” Modi wrote on X.


This was the Prime Minister’s first interaction with Senior General Min, who came to power in a military coup in February 2021.


“We also discussed bilateral relations between India and Myanmar, particularly in sectors like connectivity, capacity building, infrastructure development, and more,” he said.


Sources said the senior general thanked the prime minister for the relief assistance. He also appreciated the Prime Minister’s reconstruction work and leadership during the Bhuj earthquake in Gujarat and the learnings for Myanmar and others from it, sources said.


The BIMSTEC grouping is a regional initiative involving countries in India’s neighbourhood along the Bay of Bengal rim. India has launched Operation Brahma to help relief efforts in the earthquake-hit Myanmar, where a military coup in February 2021 brought Senior General Min to power. During the 35-minute meeting, the Myanmarese ruler appreciated the speed at which India sent in assistance immediately after the March 28 earthquake.


“We are ready to help,” the Prime Minister is learnt to have conveyed to Senior General Min. India has deployed military field hospitals in Mandalay, which was near the epicentre of the earthquake.


A senior official of the Myanmar administration also visited the hospital set up by India in Mandalay. India has also deployed its National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) personnel, who are assisting in the relief work in Myanmar. Myanmar is considered a cog in the wheel for the success of BIMSTEC, whose key aim is to promote connectivity between the member nations. All the key projects to connect the member nations pass through Myanmar, where the local administration has little control in the different regions of the country.


The massive earthquake opened an opportunity for Myanmar to engage with the global community of nations as it seeks humanitarian assistance to recover from the earthquake. Over 3,000 people have died in the Myanmar earthquake, nearly 5,000 have been injured, and over 370 remain missing nationwide.


Senior General Min also attended an official dinner for leaders of the BIMSTEC nations that also includes Thailand, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka.


The Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs said BIMSTEC members discussed disaster management during ministerial meetings on Thursday.While China has quantified the aid it has despatched to Myanmar, India has maintained that it does not believe in putting a monetary value to the humanitarian aid it extends to countries in times of crisis.

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