PANJIM, Aug. 20 -- SHASHWAT GUPTA RAY [email protected]

While the question of political representation for Goa's Scheduled Tribe (ST) community continues to occupy the public discourse, a young woman from Old Goa has quietly broken a different, less visible barrier.

Dipshikha Karmalkar has become the first girl from Goa's ST community to graduate as an engineer from an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-an achievement that has taken her from a family rooted in farming to one of India's most competitive institutions.

Dipshikha recently received her Bachelor of Technology (BTech) degree in Electrical Engineering (Power and Automation) from IIT Delhi. Her journey, however, was not paved with expensive coaching or privileged access to re...