Bridge classes

More than 5,000 volunteers in villages of Odisha ensure that the lack of digital access does not hinder children's education amid the pandemic

- PRIYA RANJAN SAHU

AT 7.30 AM every day, 23-year-old Babula Majhi spreads some straw carpets and bedsheets under a sprawling mango tree in his village of Kuabhadi, tucked away in the hills of Odisha’s Kandhamal district. He waits until 16 children gather under the tree. Then Kuabhadi’s Mo Chatashalee (literally, my school) begins its classes for the day.

Majhi is one of the 5,460 volunteers running as many