Jyoti Kumari holds a photo of her father, Mohan Paswan. She became a global celebrity after word spread of her 700-mile bicycle ride, carrying her injured father on her bike, to their village. Promises were made to reward his heroic feat. Have they been preserved?
Deepak Paswan
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Deepak Paswan
Fame is a strange beast. It brings applause, attention and promises of a better life. But when the spotlight turns on them, these promises are often forgotten. No one knows this better than 22-year-old Jyoti Kumari.
When she was 15, at the height of India’s COVID lockdownshe gained international fame for cycling more than 700 miles, from northern India to her village in the eastern state of Bihar, with her injured father on the back of the bright pink bike she bought for $20.
His father, Mohan Paswan, drove an autorickshaw for 20 years in Gurugram, a town near Delhi, send money to his wife and five children in the village of Sirhulli. After suffering a debilitating road accident in January 2020, Kumari and her mother took the train to Gurugram to take care of him.
Five months later, he still had not fully recovered and his family lacked money for food and shelter. The family decided they would all be better off at home. But at the time, authorities closed public transport due to the pandemic lockdown. No one knew how Mohan Paswan would make the trip. That’s when Kumari insisted that she take him home, on a cushion attached to the main seat of her bike.
She cycled for seven straight days, on a relatively empty stomach, at the height of the lockdown, to get him to safety. Although it was a test of endurance, Kumari discovered that she loved cycling – it came naturally to her.
लॉकडाउन था, सो अपने पिता को साइकिल पर बैठाकर गुरुग्राम से दरभंगा ले गई बेटी…
वीडियो: मोहन भारद्वाज और सीटू तिवारी pic.twitter.com/Mc7hkmyB4O– BBC News Hindi (@BBCHindi) May 19, 2020
His epic journey made headlines around the world. NPR previous report noted promises of cash rewards, training for a cycling career, even a movie contract.
Six years later
That was in 2020. “Now life is hard,” Kumari told NPR in a phone call from her home in Bihar.
What happened to all the promises made regarding financial support, particularly to support cycling as a competitive sport?
Many promises were not kept, she said.
“The politicians who made promises saying they would give money for my sports or my studies, no one gave anything,” she says. “Whatever money we collected at the time (from people who helped and from a government reward along with a cash reward), we invested it all in our house and rebuilt it. We had a brick house before, but it only had bare walls. Now we have finished it, added a toilet, a bathroom and a connection to running water. Thanks to all this, the house has finally become habitable,” she said.
This is no small feat. It is estimated that 300,000 people are homeless in the state of Bihar despite government programs. For a family living in poverty, having a home can make a huge difference in the fight for survival.
For Kumari’s family, making their home livable meant gaining something that the glare of fame had failed to achieve: a more stable place from which to build their lives.
But they do it without his father.
Mohan Paswan died of a heart attack in May 2021, just months after his daughter brought him home. Kumari says she was heartbroken. After his death, the family’s financial security became precarious.
Currently, her mother works as a cook. Her meager income supports Kumari and her three siblings at home (one older sister married and moved away).
“There are days when you go to bed hungry,” she says. “Our brother-in-law used to help us, but now he also has a child, a wife and his father to take care of. He has a small job in town. What can he really do? So now he can’t help us much.”
She nevertheless maintains hope for a better future.
“Once I complete my studies, I will then be able to do something else. Only then can I prepare myself and look for a job,” says Kumari.
But she has yet to pass the final exam required to complete Class 12, her final year of secondary school. This is an important credential for applying to college or qualifying for certain jobs. It is a springboard to a better life, especially for disadvantaged students.
A typical day
Finding time for his studies was a challenge. Kumari’s day begins at 7 a.m. She cooks and takes care of her younger siblings after her mother rushes to work. “I feed my brothers breakfast for school and prepare things for my sister. Then I clean the house, mop the floor, do the dishes, wash the clothes by hand and take a bath,” she says.
By the time she can focus on her studies, she says she feels like she has already accomplished a billion tasks. “There are days when I sleep because of the exhaustion of it all.”
What she hopes
Whatever the future holds, she is determined to stay in her home village rather than seek employment in the big city, as her father did. His experience showed him how precarious day work can be: he had no savings or medical support after his injury.
Kumari is determined to live in his native village. “Whatever I do, I want to do it from here,” she said.
She says she still loves cycling. She loves the wind in her hair, the feeling of going somewhere, of feeling free. This is what cycling means to her. But she doesn’t have as much time to do that these days because she gets bogged down with household chores and small but persistent daily worries. She can’t just ride a bike for fun or train for a competitive sport. She only rides her bike to run family errands.
With their own progress on hold, the family has quietly pinned their hopes on their younger sister who will take her final exams in mid-2027. If she can succeed and get into a good university, their prospects will improve once she graduates and starts working.
But Kumari didn’t give up. “When you are poor, fame doesn’t help. Only education can help you get out of your difficulties. Otherwise, life becomes an endless obstacle course,” says Kumari.
Kamala Thiagarajan is a freelance journalist based in Madurai, South India. She reports on global health, science and development and has been published in The New York Times, The British Medical Journalthe BBC, The guardian and other outlets. You can find it on X: @Kamal_t.
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