Attack on the 'stronghold' of red terror, no new recruitment has taken place in the Maoist movement from the district for five years.

News Topical, Digital Desk : The geographical remoteness of Gadchiroli's Sirancha taluka cannot be appreciated from Mumbai or Delhi. This taluka is 285 km from the district headquarters, Gadchiroli, while Mancherial district in the neighboring state of Telangana is only 65 km away.

During the rainy season, when Sironcha is cut off from Gadchiroli for six months, people must travel via Mancherial to Gadchiroli. In such difficult geographical conditions, the educational revolution has defeated the passion for guns.

The wonders of the education revolution

Sironcha tehsil, once known for intense Maoist activities, today has girls studying in government-run ashram schools speaking English with a level of awe that would astonish even children from convent schools in Delhi and Mumbai. It's a testament to this well-planned education revolution that no village in the district has seen any new recruitment into the Maoist movement in the past five years.

To promote education among tribal communities, the Maharashtra government, through its Social Welfare Department, launched residential schools in Vangepalli (Aheri taluka), Sironcha, and Navegaon (Gadchiroli taluka) in 2011. These schools were named "Ashramshalas."

Due to lack of transportation, children could not attend schools simply by opening them. Therefore, the concept of ashram schools was conceived, where children could live and receive education. After Devendra Fadnavis became Chief Minister in 2014, these ashram schools were further improved.

Dr. Sachin Madavi, Assistant Commissioner of Social Justice Department, says that earlier the number of children taking admission in class 6 in these Ashramshalas used to reduce to half by the time they reached class 10, but now all the three Ashramshalas have their full capacity in class 10, i.e. 40 students each.

Last year, not only did all the children from these ashram schools pass the tenth grade, but one even topped the district with a 92 percent score. For the past two years, these schools, each with a capacity of 200 students, have received over 500 applications for admission. The 200 children are selected through a lottery. Afterward, a sign is put up announcing “Housefull.”

Selection in Engineering and Medical

The girls studying in these schools in grades 9-10 not only speak fluent English, but this year two of them have also been selected for the national-level medical examination, NEET. One girl from these schools is a second-year MBBS student at the Government Medical College in Ratnagiri. More than a dozen students from here have been selected for engineering studies.

For children who cannot get admission in the schools run by the Social Welfare Department, the option of a large number of residential schools run by the Tribal Department is also open. Even there, the children study while staying in the school hostel. The administration has also started libraries in every village of the district.

The children went to ISRO by air travel

Over the past two years, 120 children from these schools have been airlifted to space stations. In June, when these children left for Bengaluru to visit the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis was present at Nagpur's Dr. Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar Airport to see them off. In 2026, the plan is to introduce the children to Rashtrapati Bhavan and President Draupadi Murmu.

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