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Hello , I’m from a small village in India. Our house is made of mud. Every monsoon we are scared it will fall on us. This year, the cracks are big, and we don’t know if we will survive this rain.
My father died in 2022. He was an alcoholic. He used to beat us every night. Me, my younger brother, and my mother used to run and hide outside, sometimes in bushes, sometimes at neighbours. Life was like a punishment.
We have nothing. No land. No toilet. No bathroom. We go outside at night. Since I was 3 years old, I was sent to relatives to study. But they made me work in fields and do all housework. I never got new clothes. Only old clothes of their children. They taunted me every day.One holiday I came home and my father threw me in anger. My back hit a stone. I still have pain when I lift anything.
He once brought a truck full of bricks to build our house, but never built anything. Now those bricks are broken and lying outside. My mother works in farms and NAREGA. We get wheat from ration shop, and for sabzi we eat red chilli paste. Sometimes neighbours give buttermilk, but it smells bad. Still we eat. We don’t have any other option.
I wanted to study. I was good in school. I got 88.17% in 10th, 92.40% in 12th. Government gave me laptop but we don’t have electricity, so it was never useful. I passed one government job exam too. I came in the second list. I verified documents. But in final list, I missed by 1 mark. Now I try to study again. But rain is coming. Our roof leaks from everywhere. When it rains, water falls on our bed, our books, on my mother while sleeping. We keep buckets and bowls but water still enters.
We had four rooms once. Now only one broken room is left. Every year rain takes one. We can’t even afford a plastic sheet to cover roof. My mother uses cow dung to cover cracks. She does this in 50°C heat, with allergies. Still she works.
My eyes are weak now but we can’t buy specs. My phone heats up when I type this.
I’ve tried everything. I tried teaching, but school gave low money and removed me. I can’t do full day work because I need to study because we don't have electricity.
I want to get a small government job so my mother doesn’t have to work like this. She made me promise I will do it. But now I am stuck. If I work to earn money, I can’t study. If I study, we can’t fix house.
We don’t know this monsoon we will live or not.
Please help us with anything you can. Even little will help me protect my mother, fix our roof and continue study.
Thank you for reading my story.
