Kaun Banega Crorepati!

Every year we hear stories about the BIG money offered to IIM grads.. This year too, almost as a matter of routine, we have been told a student of the IIM Kolkata who recieved a job offer for a salary of Rs. 1.3 Crore a year, only to be topped the next day by a student from IIM A who got Rs. 1.44 crore a year from an international finance company. It reflects the esteem that the students graduating from these centres of excellence enjoy in the corporate sector.

But these institutes are also about opening minds, raising social awareness, and most of all, creating an entrepreneurial mind set. The founding fathers had envisaged institutions that would turn out managers who would work for the country's advancement and the original IIMs have managed to fulfill their charter.

This is evident in the fact that the young man offered the Rs. 1.44 crore salary turned it down. Instead, Neela Nageshwar Vittal of Wadala wants to start a pocessing unit for medicinal plants. Vittal is an example of the new India which is moving upwards with dignity and awareness. He has grown up in the slums of Mumbai, when his father was a driver for the Lijjat Papad Co - Operative. The family fortunes have improved in time and he went to the IIM A, while his siblings became computer engineers.

The IIMs of course weren't created to make high class babus. The past few years have produced more than one story about young people like Vittal who want to use their training to become entrepreneurs or look at social betterment. Many of the people who go to IIMs are not from the rich and comfortable backgrounds. They come from families who have struggled with tougher side of life.

This is the kind of story which is worthy of Shining India. The young man has rejected his chance to go abroad on a massive salary - surely the dream of a middle class India - to follow a dream of his own. This is making the best use of his IIM training to suit his own needs.

There must be many more Vittals around, in IIM and elsewhere. Their story is inspiring and their example worth emulating. There is enough written about this generations materialistic aspirations; its time to also see the idealistic fervour among them. So the next time you see your so called "ICON" ask you with all his charm.... "Kaun Banega Crorepati?"..... just think twice before giving the answer!!!!