Education: On Patna ghat, engineer gives free coaching for govt jobs

Thousands of young students throng the sprawling banks of the mighty Ganga in Patna every weekend, just as dawn breaks. By 6 am, the steps along the banks of the river are lined with students armed with notebooks and pens, ready to write tests. Within minutes, sheets are distributed and students immediately start scribbling furiously on it. Yes, it’s heartwarming to see the Patna College Ganga Ghat in the capital of Bihar on a weekend. Graduates and undergraduates from not just Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh nearby, but even from Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Rajasthan sit here writing mock tests or understanding concepts. These students hope to crack bank or railway exams, or other competitive exams held for government jobs. The biggest draw for them is that knowledge here is passed free of cost. “I have come here for RRB NTPC preparation. The content of SK Jha sir, which is very selective. And I think that it might be helpful for my selection in RRB NTPC. That's why we are here. We all are gathered here because we support and we trust SK Jha sir . Whatever is contained, always helpful. So that's why we are here in a huge amount. You can see here that the test is almost free. And the main thing is the environment here. We are almost between 1000 to 1500 students, or maybe more. So in this type of environment, we get a competitive environment, which tests our toughness because there are only 35,000 seats and seven lakh students are selected.” That was Jitesh Kumar from Chhapra in Bihar. After cracking the preliminary test of the Railway Recruitment Board’s Non-Technical Popular category, he is preparing for its second round. If he gets selected, it could get him the job of a station master, goods guard, traffic assistant or a trains clerk – among others – in zonal railways and production units of the Indian Railways. Jitesh got to know of SK Jha’s classes from YouTube. Like Jitesh, Champa Kumari came to Patna all the way from Assam’s Khoja district to prepare for the competitive exam. “I could not get the environment at home to study for the exam through online classes,” Champa says. “If I don’t focus well and give proper time, I will not be able to crack the exam. My friends suggested that I come here. I attended a few classes and immediately realised that it’s the best that I could do for myself. The quality of the content is really good. I am here to prepare for the second round of railway exams after clearing the preliminary test.”. SK Jha, 30, is an engineer by profession and runs a coaching centre at Musallahpur Hat in Patna. But every Saturday morning from 6am to 7.30am, he conducts mock tests for students who have cleared the preliminary test of the Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) exam. On Sundays, he conducts tests for job aspirants preparing for the RRB Group D exam. His team of 15-odd teachers helps him in this. About 150 staff members help print thousands of OMR (bar-coded) question papers, answer sheets and answer keys. OMR sheets are distributed at 6 o’clock on dot, and are collected back sharp at 7.30. After this, the answer keys are distributed so that the students check their mistakes. The scorecard is released on Telegram. Jha clarifies the concepts of tricky questions on his YouTube channel. “You are well aware how unemployment is increasing in the country. Centre could not handle it. So we took recourse to the Ganga, the river that helps one and all,” Jha says. “I have a coaching institute at Musallahpur Hat in Patna, but it does not have enough space to accommodate so many unemployed students. The Ganga has a very calming effect on people. The environment is really very conducive for learning. I want my classes to be like a festival because I believe if children enjoy my classes, it will take learning to another level.” But the biggest reason why students are drawn to Jha’s classes is the fee. “I pay from my pocket for the tests that we conduct. Whatever I earn from my coaching classes at the centre I spend on these children. At my own centre, I provide free coaching classes to girls and to the specially abled. I think if society’s money goes back to society, that’s when development will happen,” he says.Jha is astounded by the popularity of his classes held along the Ganga. “When I started the classes I thought 200 to 300 students would come. I never expected students to come in thousands. You know, it’s easy to get students on just one weekend, but I really work hard to ensure that they come to me every weekend. I give them good content. We prepare them for SSC, railways and other government jobs like constables, BPSC, etc. Now, except for South India, I get students from almost the entire country.” Does he get any government support to run the classes?“No, at the moment there’s no government support. I’m doing it all alone,” Jha says. “I don’t know for how long I can sustain because the crowd of students is getting gigantic. But at the moment, I am capable of doing it. I’m not asking for any kind of support from anyone. I wish to continue taking these classes in future as well.”Jha’s classes on the Ganga riverfront are a bright ray of hope for the innumerable job aspirants who come from humble backgrounds and live in remote corners of the country and cannot afford the big tutorial institutes. Anchor: Vasundhara BoseAudio production: Prateek Kapoor