Life is not a bed of roses. The poverty ratio in India is still very high. While some get a perfect education to sit in an office and earn money, others just dream to get an education and earn money for their daily livelihood.
If current trends continue, India’s share of world GDP will significantly increase from 7.3% in 2016 to 8.5% by 2020. In 2015, around 170 million people, or 12.4%, lived in poverty (defined as $1.90 (Rs 123.5)), a reduction from 29.8% in 2009.
Have you ever imagined how does it feel to be poor? Having a dream being a poor and then executing it? Well, this man exactly has done that. His journey from just a normal being to get a job finally as a Software Inter will motivate you to fight against all odds in your life. His urge to learn and fight for his dreams is worth a narration. Thanks to the man for sharing his story!
Quora is nowadays a platform where people can share their emotions and stories. It gives us an exposure to a lot of unanswered question in life and helps us to get inspired by some really unique stories.
Question Asked In Quora
How does it feel to be extremely poor?
The Answer
I am the son of a woman who cleans other people’s house. I lost my father at a tender age of 7. Feeding us (me and my younger brother) from the meager money she earns became difficult to cover our basic needs. We used to live on a single meal per day, sometimes twice when my Mom took the half-eaten meals left on the dinner plate from others house. My family suffers from malnutrition and we are all emaciated. Our house was mud-walled and had a grass-thatched roof, which would leak terribly when the rain falls. The rain brought with them the Anopheles mosquitoes which transmitted malaria. I was the most vulnerable to malaria infections in my family. I vividly remember once I was praying to God to take my soul while lying in the hospital bed when I was 10.
My Mom took me to a government school (primary school) and got me admitted because she always encouraged us taking education seriously and said this is the only way we can come out from this situation. So I started taking my education seriously. Until 4th standard I got free books from my primary school after I passed 4th standard, I had to join a new school (secondary school) from 5th as the previous school I was studying in was having classes only up to the 4th. From 5th I had to buy books and I had to walk 6km from my house to reach my school. My Mom always reached out to people and asked books for my studies. This gave me a lot of energy and a reason to work hard and do good in my studies and I maintained the top position in my class. My classmates were always bullying me because I always studied in class even during my lunch time. Everybody got a lunch box to have lunch and when I felt hungry I went out and drank water to fill my stomach. They spoke about my dirty clothes, ripped bag but I never responded. I remember the day I asked my Mom that I have to pay exam fees to write board (10th) exam, she was not having money. Mom reached school and bowed down in front of the principal but he refused to pay my exam fees. One of my class teachers paid my board exam fees. And I cleared the 10th exam with 78% mark. My mom was so proud of me and prepared Kheer (sweet dish) for all of us. And that’s the full stop of my education. I had to stop chasing my dream knowing the facts that my Mom could not afford my further studies so I came to Bangalore from Jharkhand in search of a job with one person from my village who was working as a security guard in an apartment here in Bangalore. My Mom gave me Rs.50, but it was not sufficient to buy train ticket so I did not buy one but I had been warned that if I get caught by TTE, I would be thrown out from the train, I was lucky enough that I reached Bangalore without any problem.
I was searching for a job for 2 months but I did not get any so I went to the nearest Railway station and started working as a Coolie, selling books and news paper. I started earning enough money to feed myself 2 times and save Rs.10 every day so I can send some money home. I was first recruited by a book stall guy. I was assigned to sell the novels in one of the busiest traffic in Bangalore, I read novels when the signal was Green and started selling when it was Red. I read almost 100 novels during that time. One day a police officer caught me selling duplicate novels but when I told him the book stall owner asked me to do this job, he took me there but the stall owner refused to identify me. But somehow I convinced the police officer that I was just selling it but I did not own them. I left that job and came to a residential area and started washing cars for my living. I still didn’t get any place to stay so I used to go to Railway Station every day to sleep with my old friends over there.
Once while I was working in an apartment, one person came and asked me where I am from, for the first time in 2 years of my life in Bangalore, and also where do I stay and why I started working at this age when do I get time to study. I told him everything about me and as I can read, write and understand English, he offered me a typing job, in return, he will teach me a computer and give me a place to stay in his house. As I was very much passionate about computers, I agreed to that without thinking anything and offered a place to stay was like an icing on the cake.
He taught me how to use a computer, the internet, ms office etc. I asked many questions about the internet and gathered a lot of information. I always had 4 hrs access to his system to get the work done, gradually I started to finish the work so early, in and around 2 hrs and during the remaining time I started learning programming and other stuff. I started dreaming again. I worked with him for 4 hrs and after that I started new jobs like cooking, washing vessels, cleaning houses of his friends to earn some money for some extra bucks. After 2 months when I started working on the programming, I got pretty much knowledge but it was once again a time for bad luck as the project he was working got completed. Now I did not have access to his system anymore. All my dreams were broken into pieces again. I was afraid to ask his computer as I could have lost the place where I was staying. I was cooking for 4 guys in a house and one guy was having a second-hand laptop to sell. They were all working in TCS. I asked him about the price, first, he asked me why? and said it’s not a car wash or cook food. I just said I want to learn to program so I want to have it. They started laughing so loudly and said we didn’t learn to program in last 4 Yrs of our engineering and how can you learn just like that. He said, anyway if you want to buy it then the price will be Rs.15000. I started working so hard to get that laptop for myself so that I can start to learning programming again. I was so excited. After 3 months of hard work, I gathered Rs.12000 and I asked him if he can give it to me and rest he can deduct from my salary. He said he can’t give me Rs. 3000 in advance. I asked other houses where I had been working for more than 6 months but nobody gave me a loan of Rs.3000. I thought let me work for another month and take that laptop. After few days I heard my Mom was sick and hospitalized and needed Rs. 13000 so I had to transfer the money to my Mom.
I will definitely pursue my dream along with my work and I will be successful one day fighting all odds.
Every day I go to the internet cafe and spend about 2 hrs learning to program and found this very useful site Quora today. I feel like spending so much time reading answers. This is my first answer on Quora, I don’t know whether I will be able to make you understand how it feels to be poor but I can say that it’s a bitter-sweet journey so far, but it has made me so strong. I hope I will complete my story with a good ending one day to inspire 100s of people who simply do not pursue their dream only because they are poor and do not have access to good schools and colleges.
EDIT-1:
I am so privileged and honored for this overwhelming response. I am so grateful to everyone who has reached out to me for help. I am speechless and I don’t know how to thank you all.
EDIT-2:
I am so blessed to have met a person like Pintu sir in my life, it’s a great opportunity to share a room with him. It’s so warm when he hugged me in-front of 100s of people. It’s out of the world feeling. Thank you, Mukunda sir and Prabhakar sir for taking the time to speak with me. I got more than 1000 messages throughout the world and addressing each one of them taking time so please don’t mistake me for not replying you quickly. Thank you, all.
EDIT-3:
100s of people reaching out to me for financial help and asking me to have their laptop. I do not need any financial help or laptop, by saying that I do not really want to hurt anyone. Sorry if it hurts you anyway. I almost learned to make a static website with the help of Pintu sir. And I will have my first pay check coming next week and I have small savings so I can buy a used laptop next week. For the people who are very sensitive about me or supporting my family: I will be working few hours every week to make a website to support my family and remaining time I will be using it for myself to learn things. I need your guidance and advice throughout my life to do something great. And I love to take any programming help. Please stay in touch. Your support is so precious to me.
EDIT-4: Started working as a Software Intern at Juspay.
Thank you Quora to change my life. It could not have been possible without Quora and Pintu Sir.
