A 15-year-old migrant girl pedaled hundreds of miles to bring her injured father back to their home village. India’s cycling federation has taken notice.
Read the entire article here in The New York Times.
Jyoti came out from their village in Bihar to care for Mr. Paswan. She had dropped out of school a year ago because the family didn’t have enough money. Things got even worse after the lockdown, with their landlord threatening to kick them out and then cutting off their electricity.
When Jyoti came up with the escape plan, her father shook his head.
“I said, ‘Look, daughter, it’s not four or five kilometers that you will drag me from here. It’s 12-, 13-hundred kilometers. How will we go?’’ he said in a video broadcast by the BBC’s Hindi service.
The two bought a simple girl’s bike for the equivalent of about $20. On May 8, they set off, Jyoti at the handlebars, dad sitting pillion on back. Jyoti was pretty confident on a bike, having ridden a lot in her village.
Many days they had little food. They slept at gas stations. They lived off the generosity of strangers. Jyoti said that except for one short lift on a truck, she pedaled nearly 100 miles a day. It wasn’t easy. Her father is big, and he was carrying a bag.
As they moved down the long roads under the withering sun, many people teased them, saying it was ridiculous for a girl to pedal while her father sat on the back.