Pune Girl Beats Paralysis To Score 91.6% in Boards

Harmehar says she wants to open an NGO for spinal cord patients when she grows up.

Harmehar Garewal Kaur was pharalysed from the neck down after she met with an accident five years ago. (Photo: Prachee Kulkarni/The Quint)

Clearing the Board exams is no easy task, but for Harmehar Garewal Kaur, the journey was even more difficult. After an accident left her paralysed neck down five years ago, doctors told her Harmehar to expect the worst. But the teen and her parents refused to give up. Harmehar managed to partially regain her balance after three years of vigorous physiotherapy.

The Pune teen beat all odds to score a whopping 91.6 percent in her Class XII Board exams and bagged the second rank in her school. 

Suvinder Kaur Garewal, Harmehar’s mother, says the staff at the Army Public School, Kirkee, adjusted the school schedule so as to allow her to juggle physiotherapy with her classes. “I told them about the condition of my daughter and they adjusted the school schedule for us. They shifted all the important classes to the beginning of the day. This was very helpful as she didn’t miss any classes. Since she was attending school after such a long time, she was very regular,” says Suvinder.

Harmehar says she wants to grow up and help people with paralysis.

There are people who think differently-abled people are weak and not good enough. I want people to accept them and help them recover.

“I was expecting good marks, but not this good,” says Harmehar, adding that she wants to pursue an MBA in Economics and open an NGO for spinal cord patients.

Producer: Anubhav Mishra

Video Editor: Vivek Gupta