Her village was nestled between rolling hills and densed forests.Chumki,the ten year old adivasi girl was collecting the firewood in the nearby jungle.It was her regular practice. One day while collecting wood and breaking them to make a bundle to carry, she heard a rustling sound from the nearby dry bush.
Lo and behold… a tiger was there and seemed approaching towards her. She threw the wood and to save herself, she climbed to a tall saal tree nearby. She was trembling in fear and in anxiety she fell down from the tree on her side upon a sharp stone below. The edge of the stone tore her left arm with a deep cut.
The tiger got startled by the thumping sound and ran into the forest.Chumki too ran for her life to her home, oblivious of her bleeding arm. Her mother saw the panting child añd nursed her wound by applying some herbs and bandaging her arm with some old cloth.
It’s been forty five years now.Chumki has turned into a strong diligent woman.
The deep line of the scar in her left arm told the story of a childhood mishap.The scar stands a proof for her hard work, adventures, courage and poverty.
Chumki realized that, scars whether physical or emotional, connect us to our past and shape who we become to rise after a fall. Wasn’t her scar a badge of courage ? To escape from the attack of a tiger by a small girl was not a small thing.
It’s her courage and patience which she had, that made her to strive for education and to attend school and college .It was impossible to do at that time and that too from a remote adivasi village.
Now CHUMKI DEVI is a prominent adivasi leader.
