Japanese actress to make film on Bihar's Super 30
Patna : A former Japanese beauty queen and actress is making a documentary film on a Bihar mathematician and his innovative and successful experiment of setting up a Super 30 school that sends children from poor families to top engineering colleges in India.
Norika Fujiwara, 36, the 1992 Miss Japan and a popular model, was in Bihar last week for a shoot. "Impressed by the rare work done by Super 30 my teammates and I decided to make a documentary film and are now shooting for it," Fujiwara told IANS in an interview.
"I want to show the Japanese people how children from the poorest of poor families can fulfil their dreams with the help of an inspiring man and how it can transform their lives," added Fujiwara.
The team has completed over 75 percent shooting for the film. "I have managed to capture the essence after long discussions with the inspiring man, Anand Kumar, his few successful students and their poor parents," she said.
The film has been sponsored by the Tokyo Broadcasting System and will be shown on television.
Norika is a popular figure not only in Japan but also in Hong Kong and China. She recently married an Osaka-based comedian Tomonori Jinnai.
This is not the first time a film is being made on Super 30. Last year another Japanese television channel had made a film on the school.
The Super 30 school takes a group of 30 students mainly from poor and rural backgrounds. The students are given free coaching, food, accommodation and other facilities to help them crack the highly competitive Indian Institute of Technology-Joint Entrance Examination (IIT-JEE). It is supported with the income generated from the Ramanujan School of Mathematics run by Anand Kumar. The Ramanujan institute has students from affluent families who can afford to pay to fulfil their dreams.
Anand Kumar is actively helped by Bihar's Additional Director-General of Police Abhyanand, who teaches physics despite his busy schedule of monitoring crime in the state known for its high rate of lawlessness.
Super 30 took shape five years ago and its success can serve as a model for other such institutes across India.
Last year, 28 of its 30 students, nearly half of them from the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and three from the Scheduled Castes category, made it to the IIT- JEE. The number has been steadily growing over the years. Eighteen students cracked the IIT-JEE in 2003 the year Super 30 was set up. The number rose to 22 in 2004 and 26 in 2005.
