Rekha enjoys her ride to school and back!

Fifteen year old, Rekha comes from the village of Mau. Her father, Shyoraj, is a farmer while her mother, Kanti, is a housewife. Her father has an 8^th grade education and her mother has none. Rekha has two brothers and two sisters, all of whom live in a two room house that has no toilet or electricity, but it does have a hand pump for water. The family owns three buffaloes which provide milk and labor, and an additional source of income.

Rekha is enrolled in grade 9 at the English medium school run by Pardada Pardadi. At school, she loves learning vocational skills and is currently learning machine sewing. In the afternoon you can find her with a tape measure around her neck because of this class! After graduating from Pardada Pardadi, Rekha wants to go to school to become an air hostess; she wants to have a job so that she can look after herself in the future.

Her school also provides scholarship for girls to receive bicycles. This scholarship is given to girls that are dedicated to school and who live to far away to walk. It is also an incentive for parents to send their girls to school, who generally take them out because of the long commute. With her new bicycle, it is much safer for Rekha to come to school and even commute home, later in the evening. It is very unsafe for these girls to walk back in the dark, so the bicycle also ensures the safety of the girls. It also saves much time from taveling to school and back home, as she now only has to ride 30 minutes instead of an hour and a half, that it took her to walk home.