Makwanpur: Most of the school-age children from a Chepang community at Khairang VDC in the district are deprived of education. Former secretary of the VDC Raj Kumar Malla said more than 40 percent of the children are out of school.

Children from the marginalised community are forced to go to graze cattle and search for wild fruits and roots in forests to fill their bellies instead of making their ways to school.

VDC secretary Rabinda Kumar Shrestha said most of the children are deprived of education while some drop out midway due to poverty. Out of eight schools having around 1,000 students in the VDC, Barahi and Mahankal primary schools have little enrolment.

A local teacher Yogendra Jaisawal said children in the village do not go to school due to poverty. He said the schools in the area had huge enrolment when a

programme was launched to distribute nutritious foodstuffs among students in the past years. According to the District Development Committee, only 22 percent of the total population in the VDC is literate.

source: The Kathmandu Post,17 June 2012