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After receiving an enthusiastic welcome to a trial run in January 1995, the Vidnyanvahini's Dialogue and Action Group purchased a Tata Model 609 bus-chassis and had it furnished with laboratory and audio-visual equipment, countertops, cupboards, a water tank, and a generator. This vehicle, the MSL, was inaugurated on July 14, 1995 by the noted film actress and social activist Shabana Azmi.

VISION:

While urban India has made very impressive progress to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century, rural school education in India never quite made it out of the nineteenth. This is especially true with respect to science education due to the lack of adequate laboratories. On the global scene, India's contribution to science and technology is quite noteworthy. But education at the rural school level has suffered from benign neglect. Whereas in metropolitan India we see the wonders of technology such as satellite communication and super computers; in rural India we see poverty, a lack of basic infrastructure, and an abundance of superstitions. Vidnyanvahini's vision is to try to reduce this gap as much as possible, at least at the educational level.

OBJECTIVES:

To provide rural school children with the opportunity to handle scientific apparatus and learn the basics of science through experiments.
To create awareness of the relevance of science in the lives of rural school children by discussing concepts such as cleanliness, hygiene, safe drinking water, and the environment.
To explain the science behind some seemingly curious results, and thus help remove age-old superstitions.
To educate adolescent children on human reproduction.
To bridge the gap between urban and rural education.
To spread the message in rural communities that science can help solve the problems in their everyday lives as much as it does for the urbanites.
To hold workshops and training camps for science teachers in order to establish a dialogue with them through continuing education.

Vidnyanvahini, Pune (Public Trust Reg. No. E-2024, Pune; Tax deduction under Sec.80G of Indian Income Tax Act, 1961 available)