By Denis Giles
Every child is special in their own ways. Unfortunately, our society has evolved in such a manner that, schools have been turned to factories, where children are restricted as products, produced without logic. These products are generally categorised as Good, Average and Bad, thus deciding their future. This has been going on in our society since long and might continue till the time, our society realizes the need for a change.
While the factories continue to produce products, labelling them as Good, Average and Bad, there are few who have gone beyond the factory standards and excelled in their career. Such are the ones who bring a positive change in the society.
Meet Diana Paul, an Engineer and an MBA, who is changing lives and spreading smiles across our society. Miss Diana Paul is a B.Tech (Industrial Biotechnology) and has done her MBA (HR, Finance and Banking).
At the start of her career, there was a recession period and getting proper jobs were difficult. Diana had no much options than to start her career from a Domestic Call Centre. This was also to evade the questions of her parents, who kept worrying about her career. She worked for three months at the Call Centre and later went on to become a Programmer in a software company, a Quality Control Engineer with TVS Automobiles, Bank PO & Deputy Manager (Union Bank) and the Area Manager in the IndusInd Bank, where she was awarded ‘Best Employee of the year’ in 2016.
A peep deeper in her career revealed that Er. Diana Paul had successfully qualified in 32 Competitive Exams, which included 17 Banking and 15 Insurance exams. She had also secured ‘RANK 1’ in LIC ADO EXAM 2013. The long list of the Competitive Exams she cleared in her career includes 1) LIC ADO (Rank 1 in Southern Zone) 2013, 2) IBPS PO/Clerk 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 3) SBI PO/Clerk 2013, 2014, 2015, 4) NIACL 2014, 2015, 2016, 5) UIIC 2014, 2015, 2016 and 6) LIC AAO 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016.
When it takes years for candidates to crack Competitive Exams, the achievements of Er. Diana Paul might indicate that she has been a confident student since the beginning. But the story of Diana is something different.
Diana in her school days remained an under confident student, as there were none to understand, support and appreciate her perspective of studies. She always had a creative thinking about the subjects she was taught but unfortunately her creativity did not match the so called factory standards.
After her schooling, Diana wanted to pursue B. Arch but was forced into B. Tech (Industrial Biotechnology) by her parents. The reason being, many of her family members had served in the health sector and her parents wanted her to follow the trend.
Her initial days in B. Tech (Industrial Biotechnology) were spent under deep shock as she was not able to focus in the field which she had no interest. This had led to a lot of arrears in her first two semesters of B. Tech.
Diana tried to convince her parents but soon realized, she had no other choice remaining than to fulfil the dream of her parents. With no options remaining, Diana started working hard to cope with the course. And this time, she started using her creativity, which was always undermined in her school days. When Diana looked at the subjects with her perspective of understanding better, she was encouraged by a friend of her named Anu Priya Yadav and a few others. Later her perspective of learning received an encouragement by the college lecturers and this time Diana was unstoppable. B. Tech (Industrial Biotechnology), though wasn’t her choice; Diana had surprised all by securing the First Rank in the University.
After completing her higher education, Diana and her friend Anu Priya started preparing for Competitive Exams. Without taking any support of coaching institutes, the duo did self-study to crack the exams but were not successful initially. It was after a lot of hard work and failures that the duo could master the art of cracking Competitive Exams. They started cracking Competitive Exams one after the other, till Diana joined as a PO in the Union Bank at Kolkata.
She was then posted as Deputy Manager and secured the position of Area Manager in IndusInd Bank. During this span, in spite of securing a highly paid white collared jobs, Diana always felt something missing in her life. The situation was similar with her friend Anu Priya. The duo after contemplating a bit, decided to share their experiences and knowledge of cracking Competitive Exams with the downtrodden and needy students in far flung pockets of Kolkata city. They had fixed the Second and Fourth Saturdays for this task as the banks had a half-day working on these days.
Diana along with Anu Priya enjoyed teaching the students, upto their satisfaction and free of cost. The best of their effort was, together they succeeded in producing results and this went on till Diana received her posting orders in Saudi by the IndusInd Bank.
Upon receiving her posting orders Diana had reached Chennai. At the Chennai Airport while getting her tickets to Dubai, she took a pause and realized that she was not meant to be confined with this job. She wanted to do something which kept her happy and motivated. Diana immediately called her parents and expressed her decision of quitting the job and this was the turning point in her career. Having made up her mind, with no clear plans ahead, Diana returned to the Andamans.
While in Kolkata, volunteering to support students for Competitive Exams had always given her a sense of happiness and satisfaction. She thought about this for a while, and after few discussions with Anu Priya, the duo agreed upon reaching the benefits of their experiences, in their home town Port Blair, where candidates were struggling for years, in spite of joining in various coaching institutes.
Giving away the post of Area Manager, IndusInd Bank, Diana had returned to the Andaman & Nicobar Islands in 2017. She started coaching students in a 20 Sqft small room, with the support of Anu Priya, based in Noida. They duo christened their dream institute as ‘Pratiyogita Guru’, which was founded on 13th Oct. 2017 with only four students. And the journey of success continued ...
During the span of six years since its founding in 2017, Pratiyogita Guru has been yielding results after results, thus creating a generation of confident and successful candidates.
Some of the achievements of Pratiyogita Guru since its establishment are: BANKING - 4 IBPS clerk (2019), 1 SBI Clerk (2021), 1 IBPS PO (2020); SSC CGL - 1 (2019), SSC GD: 1 (RANK 1 in Eastern Zone) 2021 and ICAR CIARI -1 (AIR -1) 2018. The recent being Andaman Group C Exam 2023 wherein 35 students the institute cracked the exam, making Pratiyogita Guru as the only institute in the Islands to produce highest number of successful candidates at the recently held ‘Rozgar Mela’ led by the Hon’ble Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi.
It would not be inappropriate if Andaman Chronicle terms Er. Diana Paul and Ms. Anu Priya Yadav as ‘Women of Substance’, because such are the individuals who are born to bring a positive change in the society.