BHOPAL: Exception is the norm in this little village school in Madhya Pradesh’s Singrauli district, each of whose 171 students — mostly dalits and tribals — can write with both hands and knows five languages, including Spanish.Veena Vandini School has been around since July 8, 1999, when ex-Armyman B P Sharma set it up in the nondescript Budhela village, about 15km from Singrauli district headquarters, after a flash of inspiration. TOI had written about it in 2014, and now this school is suddenly back in the limelight as its videos on YouTube have crossed 1.65 lakh views and gone viral on WhatsApp.Researchers from across the globe are now calling up the school principal while scholars from South Korea, Germany, the US and many other nations have visited the school, said Sharma. Most of the students here are first-generation school goers. Many of the parents can’t sign their name but their kids are polyglots and challenge each other on who can write the fastest with both hands.To give an indication of how rare ambidexterity is, only 1% are born with the talent, but it’s a skill that can be learned. Sharma has shown that just about anyone can be ambidextrous, and it doesn’t matter if a child comes from an illiterate Gond family, he or she can still speak Spanish and Urdu with the same ease. “There are 171 students in my school. Each of them can write with both hands. Even the new students, who joined last year, can write as well, but not as fast as the old students. Students are taught five languages — Hindi, English, Sanskrit, Urdu, and we have included a foreign language, Spanish. Urdu is taught in Roman script,” Sharma said.Asked why he thought of setting up such a school, he said, “When I was returning home on vacation from my Army unit, I was reading a magazine on the bus and came across an article that said our first President, Dr Rajendra Prasad , could write with both hands. This inspired me to attempt it. Later, when I started a school in my native village, I tried training students to be ambidextrous,” said Sharma. Fifteen minutes in each period are devoted to writing with both hands, he added. The school is till Class VIII, and when the kids move on, they strike awe in their new schools.With a twinkle in his eyes, Dileep , a student of the first batch of Veena Vandini School — which had only six students — told TOI how his batchmates elsewhere would go goggle-eyed over his ambidexterity. “Knowing that I can write with both hands and converse in four languages boosted my morale. It also helped immensely in my X and XII board exams — I used to complete my papers well before the entire class,” he said.

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