Direct Rainbow.

 “Schools are not museums for the privileged,” Sister Cyril once said, her voice firm yet filled with compassion. “A school must open its doors wide enough for the poorest child to walk in without fear.”

Those words did not come from a leader making a grand speech. They came from a quiet Irish nun who landed in Kolkata in 1956, carrying nothing more than a suitcase and a burning belief that every child, no matter how small or forgotten, deserved a chance.

Her name was Sister Cyril Mooney.

When she first walked through the bustling, chaotic streets of Kolkata, she saw little children sleeping on pavements, running barefoot between traffic, selling flowers for coins they would never keep. Something inside her shifted. She hadn’t come to India to simply teach inside a classroom. She had come to change what education meant.

Years later, when she became the principal of Loreto Day School, Sealdah, she didn’t celebrate the position. Instead, she walked through the empty corridors at dawn, looking at polished floors, clean benches, neat uniforms. And she thought of those children she had seen outside. Children who had never held a pencil, who ate only if the day was kind, who didn’t even know what the inside of a school looked like.

She decided to bring them in.

The first day she invited street children to sit in the school playground, a few teachers gasped. Parents raised eyebrows. Some even complained. But the little ones came hesitantly, clutching torn cloth bags, unsure if they belonged. Sister Cyril simply smiled and said, “You are safe here. This is your place too.”

That was the beginning of the Rainbow Project.

Every afternoon, after regular school hours, the gates opened again. Girls from slums, railway platforms, and pavements walked in. They learned to read, write, dream, and stand on their own feet. Many had never been called by their real names before. Now, teachers called them with respect. Slowly, some of these children were integrated into regular classes. They studied alongside children from wealthier homes, sharing textbooks, tiffins, and laughter.

Under her leadership, the school became a living example of equality, not a slogan painted on a wall.

But Sister Cyril didn’t stop there. She traveled through villages, looking for young women who had never been to college but had the fire to teach. She trained them as “barefoot teachers” so they could carry education to the remotest corners. These women taught under trees, in makeshift huts, and sometimes even on the steps of temples and mosques. It wasn’t perfect, but it was powerful.

People often asked her how she managed such work with limited resources. She would smile mischievously and say, “If you wait for perfect conditions, children will grow old waiting.”

Many nights, she walked through the sleeping quarters of the Rainbow girls. Some children clung to dolls stitched from old clothes; some hid their schoolbooks under their pillow like treasure. She tucked the blankets around them, brushing away memories of hunger and homelessness they had once known too well.

She wasn’t just teaching them lessons. She was giving them their childhood back.

As the years passed, her impact grew. Awards arrived. Praise arrived. Journalists wrote about her, leaders met her, and educationists studied her methods. But she remained the same woman who preferred sitting among children rather than at any award ceremony. Whenever people tried to glorify her, she pointed toward her students and said, “If you want to honor me, look at them. They are my greatest achievement.”

Even after stepping down as principal, she continued working, planning, mentoring, moving across Kolkata’s underprivileged corners with a courage that surprised everyone. Age slowed her body, but never her spirit.

In June 2023, when news broke that Sister Cyril had passed away, Kolkata felt strangely quiet. Outside Loreto Sealdah, hundreds gathered — former students, teachers, street vendors, old Rainbow girls who now worked in offices or taught in schools. Many brought flowers. Some brought stories. Some brought tears.

A woman who once lived on a railway platform placed a small, worn-out school notebook near Sister Cyril’s photograph. On the first page was a sentence written in shaky handwriting from decades ago:

“Sister says I can become anything.”

As people read those words, the truth sank in.

Sister Cyril had not built schools.

She had built lives.

And somewhere in Kolkata that night, a young girl looked at the sky and whispered a silent thank you to the woman who proved that even one human heart, if brave enough, can change the future of thousands. 

-Sister M. Cyril Mooney