THE FIRST COMMUNITY BENEFICIARY
It was some time in Oct/ Nov 2006 , a few days after I had given a talk on Personal Financial Planning to the final year cadets at National Defence Academy, Pune, that I got a call from a cadet requesting for my time as he wanted to discuss his problem and seek my advice. As the end of term exams were on, I suggested that we meet after the exams.In the mean time, if he could give me an idea of his problem I could think over it.
What he said really shocked me; he was in a debt for a loan taken to pay for the initial payment he was required to make while joining NDA. This is a payment of about Rs 25000/- for expenses not covered by the Government. The rate of interest was 5% per month ,compounded monthly. His worry was that the interest payment itself would be more than his salary by the time he gets commissioned which was over a year and half ahead.
I told Cadet Naresh Kumar, (name changed), to avoid any embarrassment to him as he is getting commissioned as a Flying Officer in a few months time. I respect his privacy and must take his permission to put his photo/details on the community site.
Naresh’s Story in brief
Naresh comes from a very poor family and belongs to a remote village in a border state of India. His father was a carpenter and he has many brothers and sisters who are uneducated and poor. He was good in studies and thus got admission in a Navodaya School(government school for poor but gifted children) in his district place. As he got over 80% marks in 10th standard he was selected to study further in another Navodaya School in Chandigarh. It was here at this school that he first came to know about NDA and decided to try for admission. As he was getting ready to join NDA, his father expired adding to the already bad state of family finances.
When time to join NDA came he was faced with the problem of raising the amount required to be paid for making this initial payment. Thus the loan was arranged from a money lender. The amount had ballooned to about a hundred thousand rupees by the time he contacted me.This would increase further and would require him to pay over Rs 10000/- only as interest per month, besides the principal amount of over two hundred thousand, by the time he became an officer.
How he was helped
Help was required and soon. NDA was doing what it could and was helpless in getting him any more help, so were the banks, as they give loans only for educational expenses, this does not apply to NDA (being a government supported training establishment). My friend Rear Admiral C S Patham, who was then the Dy Comdt. took keen interest and found out that there were about 20-25 such needy cadets in NDA and are likely to be around 4-5 per course in the future. The need to find some sustainable solution was felt but the alumni association still in a nascent stage then also could not help in time.
The amount was reduced to Rs 80000/ - by negotiating with the money lender and paid by me.The seeds were thus sown in my mind to do something for needy and deserving students. The three other officers, who are my personal friends(mentioned in the history section of the site) came forward to share the loan amount, becoming the founding members of the community.