Son of Dalit labourer from Vijayapura tops SSLC exam in Karnataka

Amit Madar had lost his father when he was a small child. His mother, an agricultural labourer, toils on the farmlands of others for daily wages. She works hard to ensure that her three children get a good education

Amit Madar, a Dalit student of Government High School at Jumanal village in Vijayapura district of Karnataka, emerged as the topper in the SSLC examination 2022. He scored 625 marks out of 625.

Amit hails from a poor agricultural family in Jumanal village, which is situated about 10 km south of Vijayapura city off the Hubballi-Vijayapura road.

Amit had lost his father when he was a small child. His mother, an agricultural labourer, toils on the farmlands of others for daily wages. She works hard to ensure that all her three children get a good education. Though the family has a piece of farmland, it was given to Amit’s uncle on lease as there was none in the family to manage it.

Amit is the youngest of the three siblings. His sister is the final year of a degree course and his brother is in the second year of a degree course.

“Amit was a bookworm. He wanted to score well in academics and get a good job to lift the family out of poverty. He was always seen studying. He sacrificed all other childhood joys, like playing. He was so busy studying that he often forgot to eat,” his sister Abhilasha Madar told The Hindu.

When teachers of the Government High School in Jumanal conducted online classes during the COVID-19 lockdowns, Amit did not have a smartphone. He borrowed phones from his friends and relatives to attend the classes.

C.A. Rudragoudar, retired head master, who had taught Amit for a couple of years, says, “Jumanal Government High School is well-equipped with qualified teachers and other infrastructure, including computer section and science laboratory. The teachers in the school are such experts that they were often invited by other schools across Karnataka as resource persons to get their teachers trained. There are top private high schools in Vijayapura. But, students and parents prefer this government high school over them.”