Aditya Birla Group is way more integral to our lives than we think. My first encounter was when my aunt took me shopping and I bought a T-shirt from Peter England’s men section. Little did I know about brands so from the name I inferred it must be some foreign brand! My father had an Idea sim but I became familiar with the fact that Idea belongs to ABG through a TV commercial. In 2008, we started construction of our new house with UltraTech cement and I noticed ABG logo on cement bags. With time, as I started shopping for myself, I once noticed ABG logo on the back of the jeans and I was shocked because I associated ABG with construction material. Then I researched and realised that ABG owns not only UltraTech but Peter England and brands like Grasim whose suits were used by family in marriage of my cousin sister and other retail market. From data systems to financial management, ABG presence had impacted lives of almost every Indian.
Struggle of my life:
I come from a village in Haryana where elders are treated with respect and children are treated with love, where everything is green when you look around and air is so pure when you breath, where animals and sand gives you livelihood and the entire village is a family when you ask for help but, but girls going out for education is still astigma. A girls future and fate is decided by how good husband she will get, not by her capabilities. The highest education most of the girls in my village get is secondary school and they are married off as soon as they touch 18. Being a girl born and brought up in this village, I went through a number of challenges at every stage of my life to prove myself and change the mind-set of my villagers regarding girls’ education. I encountered my first challenge when I was shifted from government to private school by my parents. For my village, if you are spending money on private school then it has to be a boy who is being educated but I got this opportunity and I knew I had to make best out of it. I had difficulty in speaking English while my peers conversed fluently in English. I decided to be at par with all of them and started rehearsing out loud with my mother who would understand nothing of it. With time and dedication, I became good at it as finally in 11th standard I was awarded best speaker in all nearby schools.
The next challenge was to leave my home and go for higher education. I knew that getting good grades will make it easier to convince parents and reduce the social pressure of not sending a girl to study outside. Hence I tried and landed with 95% and 93% in 10th and 12th standard. I gave NIFT through which I was selected into NIFT Bangalore in the first go (as my interest was in interior designing) and IIT Mains through which I got B.tech in DCRUST which is one of the best state universities of Haryana. Obviously I wanted to join NIFT but ‘Fashion Technology’ was hard to explain to my parents and even harder for them to explain to other family members and villagers because “ yeh fashion washion toh bade logo ke kaam hai”. Till that time only a handful of boys had B.tech degree from our village. Hence, the only option my parents gave me was to join B.tech, so despite all the opposition from my family members and support from my father, I became the first girl from my village who went for B.tech in Computer science.
The next stigma to break was “ Degree ho gayi ab shaadi karlo !”. I was placed in Fidelity international and as soon as the news broke in my village, my parents started receiving social pressure to get me married. I knew in my graduation days that I have to do something to prove them wrong but at the same time create an image they want their daughters to fit in. I knew if I went for job life it would end up in marriage. I fought really hard with my parents to allow me to go for post- graduation and what they agreed upon was a government exam I can prepare for because “ Government jobs jyada safe hoti hai ladkiyoon k liye” but little did they knew I wanted to go for private sector and prepared for CAT. Finally I got admission offer from IIM Rohtak and now this was such great opportunity that they can’t have denied. Again I became the first girl from my village to do an MBA (and that too from an IIM). As people started applauding me for cracking an IIM, fathers of small girls from my village came to my family for guidance on how to educate their daughters. That was the day I realized I have made some difference and I know there is still a long battle ahead because “ Ab job lag gayi toh shaadi kar lo” will come but little do they know that this girl from their village will go on a world tour from her savings. The next stigma to break.