Udupi: Shashi Kumar (Budda Gowda) is a first-year student of BSc Nursing at Hanagal Kumareshwara Medical College, Bagalkot but he is working as a labourer here to earn the money for his course fees.
The course fee for the nursing degree is Rs 60,000. Shashi has been working for it since a month.
His father Chandappa has lived near the Karavali bypass at Udupi for 20 years. Using his father's help Shashi also got a job.
Shashi is confident that he will be able to earn between 15 to 20 thousand rupees before the commencement of classes. He is also eligible to receive about Rs 20,000 as scholarship.
"As the NEET, CET and PUC English examinations were delayed this year, I arrived at Udupi late. Otherwise, I could have earned Rs 40,000 by now. At our place it is not like Udupi: we do not have extra preparatory classes for NEET and CET, only what we learn at school. So I did not get the expected rankings. I had aspirations to become a physician. However, now I am pursuing nursing which is related to the medical sector," said Shashi.
"In Bagalkot, Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad provides CET coaching to poor students. But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there was no coaching this time. Possibly I would have scored better. Also, there were no online classes even after admission," Shashi added.
"Such students have high self-esteem and aspire to work hard to earn an education. They must be encouraged," said the retired principal of Purnaprajna College Dr AP Bhat who was approached by Shashi for work.
Shashi had come to and worked at Udupi earlier too while he was doing his pre-university college course about 2 years ago.
