Barefoot Journey to College

Barefoot college in Tilonia near Ajmer, Rajasthan, established in 1972, is the brainchild of Bunker Roy. He founded the College with the conviction that the solutions to the problems of the rural poor lie within the community, in their traditional heritage and in new technologies that simply require some adapting to their situation.

People from the rural areas who have been rejected by the present educational system are welcome in Barefoot College. Men and women irrespective of age, poor and illiterate, from the remotest of villages flow down to Tilonia so as to be taught to become professionals, ‘Barefoot professionals’ as they call.

These are the people who otherwise have no hope of getting even the lowest government job. At Barefoot College, they are trained to work as day and night school teachers, doctors, midwives, dentists and health workers.

Students enrol in Barefoot college so as to become solar engineer, solar cooker engineer, water driller, hand pump mechanic, architect, artisan, designer, mason, communicator, water tester, phone operator, blacksmith, carpenter, computer instructor, accountant or kabaad-se-jugaad professional.

Not inspired by books or by the theories of academics from urban world, Barefoot College is a result of practical experience. This is one college that respects anyone who is prepared to work, learn and share skills and knowledge.

Roy was influenced by the philosophy of Mao Zedong, and modelled his organization after Mao’s Barefoot Doctors.

It is the only college in India and probably first in the world, to be built by the poor for the poor and serves the poor and rural world.  The College started with an aim to create skilled workers from the rural community to solve local problems using traditional knowledge and sustainable technology.  As the area experiences frequent droughts, the College began with the basics of finding safe drinking water and then in 1986, it looked at the problem of getting solar power to villages.

Not just a college but an incredible idea in itself, Barefoot College has trained hundreds of semi-literate and illiterate women – many of them grandmothers – from developing and least developed countries of the world to be solar engineers. And they have gone back home to install solar panels and batteries, maintain and repair them and change life in their remote villages forever. More than that, they are training others in their villages to do the same.

The College focuses on empowering women who have traditionally been marginalised and restricted to household chores. Through a learning-by-doing process of education, the College encourages practical skills rather than paper qualifications. 

Women learn how to become ‘barefoot’ solar engineers and how to construct rooftop rainwater tanks in rural community centres. The knowledge and income the women gain improves their standing at home and in the community and provides their local schools with solar power and drinking water.

January 26 this year, Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO honoured Bunker Roy and signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Barefoot College making it the first civil society partner of UNESCO’s Global Partnership for Girls’ and Women’s Education.

UNESCO will cooperate with Barefoot College to offer technical support for establishing environmentally sound Community Empowerment Centres in villages around the world. These centres will promote girls’ and women’s education, vocational skills, women’s entrepreneurship, literacy and lifelong learning, in line with the aims of the Global Partnership launched by UNESCO in May 2011 to narrow the gender gap in secondary education and adult literacy.

Bunker Roy says, “When women are trained, they train others. We make the role of grandmothers more visible in society and show that they can be leaders. We wish to tangibly improve the quality of life of people around the world.”

“By giving the rural poor access to practical technology, Barefoot College demystifies technology and puts it in the hands of the villagers themselves” says Roy.

With little guidance and training, the villagers who otherwise become nothing more than a petty labour are exhibiting their talent and abilities. The people who have been considered ‘very ordinary’ and written off by society, are doing extraordinary things that defy description.

Why can’t this concept be replicated?