A farmhand who moved out of his two-bedroom home so that 50 students who had nowhere to go after their school collapsed in the recent rains has become an unlikely hero in Piplodi, a village of mainly tribal inhabitants in the hills of Rajasthan.
The roof of the primary school in Piplodi, Jhalawar district, had given way almost as soon as the clouds did, slabs of concrete collapsing onto the children beneath, killing seven of them and injuring 21. In that moment, on July 25, the only school in Piplodi ceased to exist.
Heartbroken, Mor Singh , a 60-year-old farm labourer who never attended school himself, offered the only asset he had ever built - his small pucca house - to the education department so that classes could continue. "Children shouldn't lose their future," was all Singh had to say.
His decision came without ceremony. Singh didn't gather the village or approach the panchayat. He only told his family - eight members, including a two-year-old grandson - they would have to leave the house and live in a temporary hut on the edge of their farmland.
No one argued. It didn't matter that he had spent four years constructing it painstakingly, between 2008 and 2012, saving what he could from daily wages and crop leftovers, buying materials in small lots while stretching every rupee. It cost him Rs 4 lakh and a lifetime of work. On July 27, Singh and his family moved into their new home - an unsteady shack of plastic and tarpaulin propped up hurriedly on a sloped patch of land that floods during monsoon.
At night, the family burnt hay to keep away insects and snakes. The roof leaked. The toddler slept in a hammock fashioned from Singh's wife Mangi Bai's old, threadbare sari. They lived with two cots, a stove, a few utensils, and stowed away most of their belongings at a relative's house.
"Two years until a new school building is ready," he said. "We'll manage." And just like that, within days of the school's collapse, classes resumed in his old house. Teachers began returning. Parents who had hesitated started sending their children. It wasn't ideal - space was tight- but it was enough.
Among the first to return to studies was Manisha - her leg still bandaged. Her eight-year-old brother Kartik had died in the collapse. Their father, Harakchand, said she had reached the school just minutes after him. "We were home when we heard it - a loud crash, then nothing," he recalled. "By the time we reached, my boy was gone." The building had shown cracks for weeks. Plaster had been falling. The roof had sagged. The warnings, residents said, had been raised more than once but ignored.
"This village was invisible to them until the day seven children died," said Rahul Kumar, 21, whose sister Priyanka was among them. "We had complained. The cracks were visible. But no one cared. Now they visit every day, scribbling who-knows-what in notebooks."
The Rajasthan govt has now declared Piplodi an 'Adarsh Gram' (model village), launching a redevelopment plan under the slogan 'Humara Sankalp - Piplodi ka Kayakalp, Hadse se Vikas Tak' (our commitment - Piplodi's transformation, from tragedy to development). A fund of Rs 1.8 crore has been sanctioned for infrastructure - a new school with a playground, along with roads, electricity, water supply, an anganwadi, a ration shop, and a health sub-centre. Families of the children who died were granted Rs 5 lakh in fixed deposits, Rs 1 lakh in cash, and given five goats and cattle sheds through the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme. District collector Ajay Singh Rathore said the administration is focused on support and rebuilding. He told TOI: "It's our responsibility to ensure development reaches them now."
The district administration did something else. Last week, it awarded Singh a cheque of Rs 1 lakh for his extraordinary gesture. Asked what he did with the money, Singh said he used it to build a cattleshed on higher ground. "The animals started falling sick from waterlogged grazing areas. A platform for the hut would have helped us more. But animals needed it first."
Mor Singh's house remains the only place in Piplodi where learning continues. He visits occasionally, sometimes just to stand outside and listen. But most days, he stays near the hut, tending to the cattle.
Audit warnings
In recent years, multiple reports have flagged the poor condition of school infrastructure across rural Rajasthan. A 2024 report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India highlighted that 38% of govt school buildings needed urgent repair.
The roof of the primary school in Piplodi, Jhalawar district, had given way almost as soon as the clouds did, slabs of concrete collapsing onto the children beneath, killing seven of them and injuring 21. In that moment, on July 25, the only school in Piplodi ceased to exist.
Heartbroken, Mor Singh , a 60-year-old farm labourer who never attended school himself, offered the only asset he had ever built - his small pucca house - to the education department so that classes could continue. "Children shouldn't lose their future," was all Singh had to say.
His decision came without ceremony. Singh didn't gather the village or approach the panchayat. He only told his family - eight members, including a two-year-old grandson - they would have to leave the house and live in a temporary hut on the edge of their farmland.
No one argued. It didn't matter that he had spent four years constructing it painstakingly, between 2008 and 2012, saving what he could from daily wages and crop leftovers, buying materials in small lots while stretching every rupee. It cost him Rs 4 lakh and a lifetime of work. On July 27, Singh and his family moved into their new home - an unsteady shack of plastic and tarpaulin propped up hurriedly on a sloped patch of land that floods during monsoon.
At night, the family burnt hay to keep away insects and snakes. The roof leaked. The toddler slept in a hammock fashioned from Singh's wife Mangi Bai's old, threadbare sari. They lived with two cots, a stove, a few utensils, and stowed away most of their belongings at a relative's house.
"Two years until a new school building is ready," he said. "We'll manage." And just like that, within days of the school's collapse, classes resumed in his old house. Teachers began returning. Parents who had hesitated started sending their children. It wasn't ideal - space was tight- but it was enough.
Among the first to return to studies was Manisha - her leg still bandaged. Her eight-year-old brother Kartik had died in the collapse. Their father, Harakchand, said she had reached the school just minutes after him. "We were home when we heard it - a loud crash, then nothing," he recalled. "By the time we reached, my boy was gone." The building had shown cracks for weeks. Plaster had been falling. The roof had sagged. The warnings, residents said, had been raised more than once but ignored.
"This village was invisible to them until the day seven children died," said Rahul Kumar, 21, whose sister Priyanka was among them. "We had complained. The cracks were visible. But no one cared. Now they visit every day, scribbling who-knows-what in notebooks."
The Rajasthan govt has now declared Piplodi an 'Adarsh Gram' (model village), launching a redevelopment plan under the slogan 'Humara Sankalp - Piplodi ka Kayakalp, Hadse se Vikas Tak' (our commitment - Piplodi's transformation, from tragedy to development). A fund of Rs 1.8 crore has been sanctioned for infrastructure - a new school with a playground, along with roads, electricity, water supply, an anganwadi, a ration shop, and a health sub-centre. Families of the children who died were granted Rs 5 lakh in fixed deposits, Rs 1 lakh in cash, and given five goats and cattle sheds through the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme. District collector Ajay Singh Rathore said the administration is focused on support and rebuilding. He told TOI: "It's our responsibility to ensure development reaches them now."
The district administration did something else. Last week, it awarded Singh a cheque of Rs 1 lakh for his extraordinary gesture. Asked what he did with the money, Singh said he used it to build a cattleshed on higher ground. "The animals started falling sick from waterlogged grazing areas. A platform for the hut would have helped us more. But animals needed it first."
Mor Singh's house remains the only place in Piplodi where learning continues. He visits occasionally, sometimes just to stand outside and listen. But most days, he stays near the hut, tending to the cattle.
Audit warnings
In recent years, multiple reports have flagged the poor condition of school infrastructure across rural Rajasthan. A 2024 report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India highlighted that 38% of govt school buildings needed urgent repair.
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