PART A
One of the major indicators of success is owning a house. My parents had a similar dream back in the late 1990s. We had lived in a joint family until I was seven. It was in 2001 wherein we moved to Asansol and stayed in a rented home while our new house was being built. Back then, I vividly remember the UltraTech cement bags being placed outside the plot for the construction.
Cement is just one of the many facets where Aditya Birla Group has its reach with others being telecommunication, retail, life insurance and asset management.
I still remember a gift that I received from a friend as a farewell token in our undergraduate college – a black full sleeve Allen Solly shirt. After landing a corporate job, I got inclined towards dressing up properly which included fabrics from the finest clothing brands like Van Heusen and Louis Philippe with currently the almirah in my college being filled with such brands’ shirts.
To add to these, we can find all these under a single roof – Pantaloons, a name that resonates in the mind of every commoner in the country, a name that can be associated as yet another subsidiary of Aditya Birla Group.
In the telecommunication front, it also helps in disappearing distances. My first ever cell phone had an Idea sim card. Now that Idea and Vodafone have merged, it is the leading telecom service provider in India and second largest globally, offering superior voice and broadband connectivity reaching nearly 5 lakh towns and villages.
I have also always loved travelling in railways since my childhood. It was only in the recent past that I learnt Birla Copper fulfils Railways’ copper requirements and it’s also believed that the tyre in every alternate car has Birla Carbon in it.
ABG reaches out to millions of lives by adding value and purpose by incorporating welfare activities such as polio vaccinations and scholarship programs, thus improving the quality of life of a common citizen.
PART-B
It was an overcast Friday morning when I visited the neighbouring school to participate in an Inter-School cultural fest. My name was next in the solo singing category. I went up on stage and midway through my performance, I forgot all the lyrics. I went numb while the music kept on playing. I could see the faces of 700-odd people in attendance smirking and talking in each other’s ears. I reiterated my previous lyrics and ran off the stage at the earliest moment possible.
I was only twelve years of age then and this embarrassment hit me hard. It took me quite some time to convince myself that it was just an accident. What intrigued me was that I could go on stage and participate in debates and speeches without any hustle. I had represented my school in public speaking events on various platforms and received accolades as well.
Hence, I decided to keep on persisting to conquer my fear of forgetting lyrics. I think the most important thing to do was self-reflection. I used to constantly keep on prepping myself up before any event. I realized that it was the mind that I had to win. I had to convince my inner self to forget the past as just another day and look for newer ventures.
A year later, I went back on stage but unfortunately, history repeated itself, albeit on a smaller scale. It did give me a bit of solace and I decided to reflect more. Being a big football fan, I used to ponder and study how professional players manage to keep themselves focussed even after the criticisms on such a global scale. What I learnt was one should never let the fear of losing overcome the excitement of winning. I also read a beautiful book on the power of the subconscious mind, which helped me shape my thinking. Therein I learnt how to always think and feel positive by repeating a concise set of words as to how do I see my future. I practised it for a few weeks and looking back now, I feel it did bear positive results in certain spheres.
A few years later, I got an opportunity to organize and perform in a post-induction cultural event at my workplace. Right from finalizing the line-up to allocating office space for practice, I was in the midst of it all. I performed a medley of old and new Hindi songs. It was a spotless performance which proved to be a stepping stone for further recognition as I continued performing for my workplace and even now in college.
One could also extrapolate these learnings in other spheres of life like education to get positive results. Ultimately what matters is that one has to move out of their comfort zone to grow and achieve more.
#ABGLPWooMe #NITIEMumbai
