Alapuzha (Ker): Aiming to become a teacher, a 17-year-old poor girl from Andhra Pradesh, whose father does odd jobs for a living, decided to beg to raise money for achieving her goal.
The girl, Shravana, was found begging in front of the government hospital here by an autorickshaw driver recently who informed the Child Welfare committee.
The girl, who was staying with some beggars and migrant workers from Andhra Pradesh, has been shifted to the Alapuzha mahila mandiram (women’s home), police said.
Hailing from Puttaparthy,the girl,who speaks fluent English besides her mother tongue Telugu, has studied upto plus two in the commerce stream scoring 750 marks out of 1000. She told police her mother was undergoing treatment at a hospital in Puttaparthy and her father, who does odd jobs, was looking after her.
She could not turn to her father for her Teachers Training course and the best option she thought was to beg. Though she wanted to become a nurse earlier, she had to give up her dream as she had some problems with her left arm.
But becoming a teacher was not that easy as she realised.
The girl came down to Alapuzha, considered the Venice of the East, and a favourite haunt of tourists, hoping to raise money to achieve her goal by begging, police said.
In the past nine days, she told police she managed to make rs 2834.
Shravana said she had come to Kerala with another person from Andhra Pradesh, who was also a beggar. (PTI)