Jamshedpur: Lacking even a primary school, a hilly tribal village some 17km from here, will soon become arguably the only village in the state where children and adults get e-learning.

A long drive to scenic Chhota Talsa, Sundernagar, in Jamshedpur block, by an executive of Tata Steel subsidiary, Gaurav Anand, 41, with his family, last month, set the ball rolling.

Flanked by hills, Chhota Talsa has dismal literacy figures of 55.89 per cent, 10 notches below Jharkhand's 66.4 per cent. Male literacy is 66.19 per cent. Female literacy is barely 46, meaning more than half of the women can't read or write.

During his visit, Anand, while interacting with villagers - most from the Santhal tribe - was struck by three things. One, the village with 150 children did not have a school and children had to walk at least 5km on hilly terrain to reach the nearest schools, forcing many, especially girls, to drop out. Two, adults and children were genuinely interested in education. Three, tribal villagers here did not drink.

An impressed Anand, who is Jusco chief manager, environment and sustainability, came home with two ideas. Whether e-learning for the village was feasible with him and his wife Jyotsna, 36, as teachers for starters. And, whether XLRI students could go to Chhota Talsa as part of their existing village exposure tours to help Chhota Talsa youngsters get face-to-face classroom education once a month.

"I am a BTech and my wife has a political science honours degree. We can put our education to good use if we can teach even a handful of tribal children through e-learning," Anand, a father of two girls, studying in LKG and Class V at JH Tarapore School, told this paper.

"With this idea in mind, I planned the e-Shiksha project," he said. "I will donate a computer equipped with a web camera and internet to the village community hall and my wife and I will teach villagers, adults and children alike from my home (Professional Flats, Kadma) over internet. Villagers, including former mukhiya Kanhu Murmu, have supported us. We will install the infrastructure in the village by May and after gathering textbooks of various classes hope to start e-learning for children and adults in July. Investment won't be much, around Rs 40,000," said the Jusco official, who already donated some books of fiction, textbooks and competitive exam books to villagers in a recent visit. "We will also give career tips to older children."

His own efforts apart, Anand held talks with students of XLRI's Social Initiative Group for Managerial Assistance (Sigma), a students' outfit, on the viability of B-school students going to Chhota Talsa.

XLRI student and Sigma member Pravesh Jain said, "Yes, we had a talk with Jusco executive Gaurav Anand and are excited about it."

Praising the initiative, former mukhiya Kanhu Murmu said the nearest schools, either in Nandup in Sundernagar or Bindapur in Gamharia block of Seraikela-Kharsawan, were both 5km away. "As the terrain is hilly, many small children can't walk the stretch. We are really happy with the proposed e-Shiksha project."