Award & Recognition

The school is declared as a Minority Educational Institution by the National Commission for Minority Educational Institution, Government of India. The school is affiliated to both West Bengal Board of Secondary Education and West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education. The school is contributing significantly to inclusive national progress by providing high quality education to all, transcending the socio-economic barriers of the society. A renowned English writer and researcher Jeremy Seabrook in his critically acclaimed book titled “People Without History”published by Navayana in 2011 has devoted a chapter on the School. Excerpts from the book:

 

This is the most dramatic, but certainly not the whole, story of Topsia, which covers a wide area. On the edge of Topsia, there is splendid new school set up by philanthropist Shaikh Shamsher Alam in 2002, specifically for the education of the children of the ‘socially and economically deprived strata of the society.’ He says,

 

“Children who go to government schools find the environment unattractive and punitive, a repellent to education. It was my intention to make an environment that drew children towards education, so that they would prefer school to home. I wanted to create an addiction to school. We are trying to provide a liberal education without compromising Islam. This involves showing parents that education is not just instrumental, that the making of good human being and a responsible citizen is also the purpose of education. We have to overcome social traditions that claim religious sanction, but in fact have none.”

 

We met the teachers on the last day of the term before the summer vacation. There were about 30 or 40, mainly young women, animated by a sense of mission and possessed of an unusually purposeful energy.