Bhopal, MADHYA PRADESH / SAUDI ARABIA :
Bengaluru :
“A Muslim from Saudi Arabia being recognized and awarded by the BJP government. This is India.” This is how Syed Mohsin rejoiced when his mother was conferred the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman 017 in Bengaluru on Monday.
Zeenat Mussarat Jafri, 65, was given the award by President Pranab Mukherjee for providing quality education to children of Indian expatriates in Saudi Arabia. She started the first Indian school in Riyadh in 1982. “My mother is also the first woman of Indian origin from Saudi Arabia to get the Pravasi Samman,” Mohsin’s elder brother Syed Mudassir told TOI.
A native of Lucknow and a former teacher at Kendriya Vidyalaya, Zeenat went to Saudi Arabia in 1979 with her husband Musarrat Jafri, a former DRDO scientist who later joined the Saudi government as a chemical expert.
Zeenat said: “I was moved by the plight of Indians living in Riyadh. Most of them had left their children behind in India because of a lack of educational opportunities. We wanted to do something and that’s when we met Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi when she visited Riyadh in 1982. We requested her to speak to Saudi authorities and get permission to start a school for Indian children. We got the green signal.”
Zeenat established the International Indian School in Riyadh from the family’s savings. From the first batch of 20 students in 1982, the school now has 12,000 students and is affiliated to CBSE. “I get angry when people pull their children out of schools. I want them to complete graduation,” said Zeenat, who is running the school for the past four decades.
But what’s more Indian about Zeenat and her husband Jafri is that they haven’t given up their Indian citizenship.Since Saudi Arabia does not allow for dual citizenship, they have accepted permanent resident status. “I am an Indian and I will always be an Indian,” she said.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Bangalore News / by Rakesh Prakash / TNN / January 10th, 2017