From beedi leaves to blackboard: A mother's toil and a son's triumph

Child labour remains a grim reality as children assist parents to meet quotas

- AAISHA SABIR

HYDERABAD: In the narrow lanes of a small town in Telangana where the scent of dried tendu leaves lingers in the air, Adlagatta Gangadhar, now a 59-year-old headmaster and renowned abacus teacher, recalls his childhood—not with bitterness, but with quiet pride.

"I was five or six when I started helping my mother roll beedis," he says. "I used to cut the leaves, tie the threads, and bundle them into neat stacks. That was our life from morning till night."

Like millions of beedi workers across India, his mother earned a few rupees a day, often less than Rs 150 after hours of manual labour.