GURUGRAM: Many years back, Sujata Sahu was hiking the heights of Ladakh when she came upon local teachers heading back to Leh to get midday-meal supplies and uniforms for their students, a journey that usually takes a minimum of four days. Seeing such commitment inspired this resident of Sohna Road to start an initiative to improve education for kids in the remotest of villages."Since then, I have been working with children in various capacities, whether it is teaching them, or taking them for trekking," she told TOI. It’s how Sujata, 50, got the moniker of ‘iron lady’.Her tryst with Ladakh began when her husband — also an avid trekker and corporate dropout — egged her to do a solo trek. She was teaching maths and science at The Shri Ram School (Moulsari campus), having called time on her corporate career after moving back to India from the US."Many are unaware just how tough and treacherous the terrain is. While on one of my treks, I fell severely ill and stayed for a night at a village which had just one house," she recalled."The village had nothing else, no medical facilities, no shops. I managed to survive that ordeal despite suffering from a severe lack of oxygen." It was during the trek that Sujata came across a school which had only one teacher and three students, and another with eight students and three teachers (two of whom were on their way to Leh for provisions). Children, she found, were being taught in English medium from a teacher who himself had learnt in Urdu medium. "It was then that I decided to do something to improve the lives of the children there."In 2011, unable to convince NGOs to partner her, she again travelled north, now with her husband and their Ladakhi partner, to one of the most isolated villages in Ladakh, a trip that took them three days to complete. They trekked carrying 1,500kg of education material on 25 horses, crossing three mountain passes in temperatures that plunged to -20C. In such arduous conditions was the 17000 ft Foundation born.Today, Sujata’s work spans Ladakh, covering 300 government schools. It’s a journey that’s been crowdfunded by Mumbai-based ImpactGuru. Her non-profit has built toilets and playgrounds, furnished dormitories, and donated libraries, solar panels, tablets and books — even mentored teachers in the harshest of winters."For us, education does not have a season. We work 12 months a year, travelling to each of our schools, providing equipment, conducting workshops or training teachers to ensure the students get the best education," Sujata explained.Having something as essential as a playground, she maintains, gives parents an incentive to enrol their children in nearby government schools, instead of sending them alone to private scho-ols in distant Leh. And Sujata’s driven to do that little bit extra."Earlier this year, we raised around Rs 3 lakh to help in translating, contextualising, printing and distributing storybooks for the 30,000 school-going children in this region, in their mother tongue, Bhoti," she revealed. So far, Sujata and 17000 ft have set up 280 school libraries and 140 playgrounds, and trained over 1,000 teachers. Ultimately, her aim is to reach out to more, similarly inaccessible, areas, not just in India but across the world, and to create happy learning spaces for children.

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