MY JOURNEY

The dream becomes a mission when you start working to get it.

But Dream is a Dream until you get it.

I belong to a village in western UP, where there was no formal school when I started my schooling. I started my education from a school which was running in a house, and I studied there till class 7th and joined a school in a small town in class 8th moved to Bareilly city in class 10th.

I was with no idea why I was studying in passing 10th, 12th & B.Sc. And English was just a dream, as English was only one subject to pass. There was no vision/mission in life, I was just studying for the sake of getting literate. 

After getting a B.Sc degree, there was nothing to do. So thought to move to Delhi to get a job so that I could run my hand to mouth life. But didn't get any work, so I started teaching as a private tutor. And It was also challenging to teach, as CBSE/ISCE board had a lot of English, and parents wanted a teacher who could speak well in English. After spending 2 years, I was well equipped with the teaching practices.

By now, I knew what I wanted to do in life after 22 years of my age, I decided to do something in life. I started to learn English while teaching and decided to study further. It was like studying while teaching and I gave a CAT/MAT in 2005 and took admission in MBA in IILM Gurgaon. During 2004/5/6 research, I got to know about IIMs name. And when I took admission to MBA, I got to know the brand value of IIMA. Now It became a dream. I knew I would never be able to get into IIM, and then IIM-A was again a dream of dreams.

After my first MBA, I started my corporate life and built a good network. I kept teaching as a private tutor for mathematics, economics, and other management subjects for graduate, undergraduate, and school students. And I did another distance learning MBA from Punjab technical university in 2012.

Now I wanted something big, something right in academic, so started preparing for the GMAT exam. I wanted to learn to grow, so I decided to do an MBA from a top tier B-school and got admission offers from 3 good UK universities and 1 Canada university. IIMA was a dream but not on the list because I knew I would never be accepted in IIMA. I have seen people with 99+ percentiles in CAT, and 740+ in GMAT with excellent academics don't get admission, and I was no-where. I applied for EPGP just for the sake of experience. I forgot it after submitting my application and gave my GMAT. I received a call from Hughes to appear in the test or submit a test score, and I did it at the last moment. 

The real ambition started when I got an email that I qualified with the test scores and was asked for the interview round. I was highly excited that I received a call from IIMA. Again, getting admission was still not in my mind. Because I knew the IIMA admission process & rigor. I thought there would be people with excellent academics, toppers from IITs, NITs, and with some great name in corporate and good experiences. But I dared to be confident and prepared myself for the IIMA interview. Just to feel IIMA vibes, and to see the campus inside, I opted for my interview in the IIMA campus instead of Delhi. 

When I landed in IIMA campus first time, I felt there was a different feeling. I touched that land at the entrance gate. I thanked God that he gave me an opportunity to enter 'the IIMA' (the dream temple of education). I took lots of photographs and bought an IIMA logo T-Shirt. Being a social media guy, I wanted to publish pictures on Facebook and other social media platforms. But, I realized that If I don't get admission, I won't be able to answer to the people. So I didn't publish any pic on FB and other social media and kept that t-shirt in my wardrobe with the intention that If I get selected, I'll wear that t-shirt. Else will keep in the wardrobe only as a memory that I went to IIMA someday.

The day, 6 August 2018, when I received an admission offer email from IIMA's program chair Mr. Biju Varrkey. It was like a 440 volts shock, I called my family and started crying. It was like I got everything. I got wings and started flying in clouds, and could experience the breeze touching my body and tickling. I could feel it, I was super super excited. 

And that's how I got my IIMA dream come true.