When Sangeeta Maurya first received her posting in a small village school in UP’s Raebareli district, she broke down in tears. Having cleared the challenging University Grants Commission National Eligibility Test (UGC NET), she had imagined herself in a well-equipped classroom, filled with eager students.

Instead, she found herself standing inside a crumbling building with broken benches, absent children, and silence that stretched down the dusty corridors.

She wondered if this was truly where her teaching journey would begin.

Today, 12 years later, she smiles when she recalls that moment. “If I hadn’t stayed,” she says, “I would never have learnt the true meaning of teaching.”

Wearing many hats

Sangeeta now teaches Sanskrit, English, and Hindi at an upper primary school in D Block, Raebareli. The school has only three teachers in total, each one covering multiple subjects. Between them, they handle everything from mathematics to science, whether or not it is their area of expertise.

“In rural schools, you are........

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