MBA student from remote village among 7 students to win Rs 1.5 lakh in all-India contest
The place 22-year-old Shailesh Nirala calls home is 20 km from a college and the nearest bookstore, 15 km from the closest cyber café, 10 km from a bank, and has only recently started getting electricity for 12 hours a day.
On September 18, Nirala would take a train home - in Dhuska village, Uttar Pradesh - and walk 10 km to the nearest bank to ensure that no one from his village will have to walk 15 km for internet access again.
Nirala was one of seven B-school students - out of 450 contenders from across the country - who won Rs 1.5 lakh in the Godrej LOUD contest held in Vikhroli on Thursday.
Nirala, in his winning presentation, had expressed desire to set up an information centre in Dhuska to help villagers browse through newspapers, magazines, employment websites and access information about agricultural practices.
After spending his first 12 years in Dhuska, Nirala had got a scholarship to finish his schooling in Bokaro, Jharkhand, where, for the firs time, he saw a computer and learnt English.
The youngest of four children of a farmer, Nirala paid his way through BBA by working as a bank assistant. Currently pursuing an MBA at Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), Delhi, Nirala said, "People say mean things to students who manage to make their way out of the village. They assume their lack of exposure means they are not bright. The only reason I was able to get this far was because I managed to top my school and get a scholarship."
"Of the 2,000-odd residents, few manage to achieve enough to get out of the village and even fewer go back to help others," he said. "I have spoken to the village panchayat and they have arranged for a room for setting up the communication centre. I'd been trying to find funding for the project since last year," he said. He plans to install two computers with printers, webcam and Internet connection within a week of returning to his village from Mumbai on September 18.
The place 22-year-old Shailesh Nirala calls home is 20 km from a college and the nearest bookstore, 15 km from the closest cyber café, 10 km from a bank, and has only recently started getting electricity for 12 hours a day.
On September 18, Nirala would take a train home - in Dhuska village, Uttar Pradesh - and walk 10 km to the nearest bank to ensure that no one from his village will have to walk 15 km for internet access again.
Nirala was one of seven B-school students - out of 450 contenders from across the country - who won Rs 1.5 lakh in the Godrej LOUD contest held in Vikhroli on Thursday.
Nirala, in his winning presentation, had expressed desire to set up an information centre in Dhuska to help villagers browse through newspapers, magazines, employment websites and access information about agricultural practices.
After spending his first 12 years in Dhuska, Nirala had got a scholarship to finish his schooling in Bokaro, Jharkhand, where, for the firs time, he saw a computer and learnt English.
The youngest of four children of a farmer, Nirala paid his way through BBA by working as a bank assistant. Currently pursuing an MBA at Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), Delhi, Nirala said, "People say mean things to students who manage to make their way out of the village. They assume their lack of exposure means they are not bright. The only reason I was able to get this far was because I managed to top my school and get a scholarship."
"Of the 2,000-odd residents, few manage to achieve enough to get out of the village and even fewer go back to help others," he said. "I have spoken to the village panchayat and they have arranged for a room for setting up the communication centre. I'd been trying to find funding for the project since last year," he said. He plans to install two computers with printers, webcam and Internet connection within a week of returning to his village from Mumbai on September 18.
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