Savitri Khan

A trailblazing Indian social reformer who transformed tribal education in Odisha

In the remote tribal villages of Odisha, Savitri Khan (1927-1998) engineered an education revolution that challenged centuries-old caste and gender barriers. Despite being born into a Brahmin family during British colonial rule, Khan dedicated her life to creating mobile schools that served India's marginalized Adivasi communities.

Her revolutionary "Tree-Shade Pedagogy" system enabled literacy rates among tribal girls to jump from 3% to 68% within two decades. Khan's UNESCO-recognized curriculum blended traditional ecological knowledge with modern sciences, creating bilingual textbooks in Odia and tribal dialects like Santali.

When religious fundamentalists burned her schools in 1972, Khan led 300 Adivasi women on a 450km protest march to New Delhi, resulting in landmark tribal education legislation. Her Oxford University-published research on participatory pedagogy remains foundational in post-colonial education studies.