🏠 Pratigya Abhiyan · Academic Head, 2023 → now
A low-SES, mixed-age, first-generation, loosely-structured academic-tutoring model - teaching children six days a week, two hours every evening.
What does an Academic Head do?
Three years in, I know every child by name - their strengths and their off days, which volunteer they like studying with, what songs they love, what they carry from home, their family and sibling dynamics. I've even taught most of their first cousins. That's the real advantage: getting to just be with them, enjoying what they do and why, collecting all those random stories.
And then there's the logistics. Ten children, two volunteers - who do you pair with whom? Only two classrooms, kids from Grade 1 to 12 - who sits where, based on what each child needs? You decide fast, you keep listening, and you're still teaching yourself the whole time, because it's an NGO and there's never quite enough hands or resources.
And the title itself? The visible positions were quietly kept for whoever worked in the limelight - the usual favouritism and politics. Academic Head came to me for the one reason that isn't political: I'm the one who actually knows the children.
UDAAN - the part no one prepares you for
UDAAN: why does it matter?
UDAAN is the one event where these children finally get a real stage - to perform the extra-curricular skills they've practised, in front of their parents, the way private-school kids get to by default. The catch is everything around it: the staffing, the politics, the thin resources. Working in an NGO always teaches you something; the best lesson for me has been learning to work my way through the constraints and still enjoy my role, making the best of it.
My journey over the years
Across 2024, 2025 and 2026 I grew into the overall Performance Head - a big leap, and a strange one: I never had the formal authority, but I led anyway.
2024
First year. I didn't really know my role yet - I was exploring everything, like every other first-year. But I couldn't sit there with the children who weren't performing, watching them stare at the ones who happily were. So I stepped in and led a six-minute dance performance with 21 children.
2025
Second year. The strange in-between: you finally have some authority, but you're squeezed from every side - seniors, juniors, your own batch - everyone quietly keeping the people in position happy so they'll be handed the lead next year. I was always leading from the back. More than anything, it taught me how not to behave once you're in a leadership role.
2026
The year I didn't lead - and led anyway. The people in position couldn't pull it together, so it landed on me. And I shaped all of it: the ideation, assigning and mentoring volunteers, watching every single performance, deciding how many children and what each act was trying to say - while also running a whole act myself alongside.
Year after year, I'd watched parents walk away from UDAAN with nothing for themselves. So this time I didn't want just an annual day - I wanted an experience parents could actually learn from: a story that followed a child growing up in a low-SES home - the pressures from the world, from parents, from academics all at once - and how a parent can understand and stand beside them through it.
Children were the reason I kept going. They always are. Administration management isn't my thing, but it shows up anyway - and when the volunteers, the children, and most of the time even the people in charge all come to you when they need an answer, I think that proves the point. Who's in the lead, anyway?
The main day is a game of chance. The magic is everything before it - a month of small, casual, everyday wonder, run on three hours of sleep.
🔬 STEM Conclave 2026 · Student Experience Lead
In the middle of UDAAN, a research project, my final papers and my academics, this event dropped into my lap. The irony of an NGO: it uses you like a sponge and rarely hands you the authority to match - yet you're still expected to deliver, on top of everything you're already carrying.
I was designing an experience for first-generation, low-SES 10th-graders about to enter 11th grade - kids weighing whether to choose science, who had never been introduced to it, or shown what it could look like in their future. The whole student experience was about capturing that and bringing it alive: making it feel real, making it feel theirs, making them feel they belong here.
The hard part was mapping four stations so 100 girls could explore an engineering college from every side - and clubbing it all into a single hour: briefing every volunteer, meeting each child at her level, telling the teachers why each station mattered, and leading right alongside. Every detail mattered, and every detail was designed by me in some way. Sanjhi Sikhiya organised it, bringing together Avanti Fellows, Youth United and Pratigya Abhiyan's volunteers - but this was the part I designed and led, from the front and from behind. A step closer to what I want to build for elementary children, and a glimpse of what's possible under my leadership. The Indian Express covered it too, at the level they can imagine. I wanted to give them an experience that finally lets them visualise themselves, and think: maybe this is for me too.
AAC toollow SESneurodiversity
Bolo
An icon-driven AAC prototype for speech-delayed and neurodivergent kids, shaped from two years of watching children at Samadhan India struggle to be understood. It's available in 13 regional Indian languages; the voice currently works in English and Hindi, with more on the way.
Try Bolo →
early literacylow SESphonics app
Akhar Awaaz
A low-cost, multi-sensory phonics app for kids learning English as a non-native language, born straight out of teaching at Pratigya.
I'd love to add a sound feature next, and I'm still figuring out how. Even without it, this already helps.
Try Akhar Awaaz →
writing
Queen's Commonwealth Essay Competition
Silver Award winner, 2022 and 2023, back to back. Long before the apps and the studies, writing was how I first made sense of all of this.
▸ Read QCEC 2022
A poem from the eyes of an Indian paramedic (ambulance driver). Delhi, April 30, 2020.
It was a day like no other, when I lost my mother.
On April 15, 2020, while I was rushing my way to the hospital,
hoping for a miracle, but this became my last meeting, before her dreading dismissal.
This all started a few months back, when I was lying comfortably in my small shack,
thinking about the expenses I made after a very long day.
At that very moment, I heard the siren for my next call.
In no time, I packed my stuff, and left the station for my next location,
which was none other than a seventy-year-old male diagnosed as a COVID patient.
It wasn't too far or too close, and I knew him, so it was a big deal after all.
But little did I know, that this call was just the start of an ominous thunderstorm.
Before joining this field, I thought I knew all its pros and cons,
while experiencing death being an inevitable part of my job. But COVID proved me wrong.
Few days later he died. I was heartbroken, but I didn't cry,
as I understood the fact of how precious my life was.
For what's gone cannot come back; all we have is their memories and mistakes to work upon before another setback.
Despite that, what a wonderful soul he was.
3 months later, with a rising number of COVID cases, I was working all day long, with no days off.
Most of the time I didn't go back home, just to make sure my family was safe, but they were all alone.
To make things worse, my wife lost her job, as most factories in India were already cut off.
Every passing day seems like a load to carry, with my salary not enough to handle the entire burden of my family.
At times it became almost impossible to send home the money I earned,
as I didn't know how to send money digitally through my account,
mortgaging my wife's jewellery was the only method we found.
Now, it doesn't matter how many patients I carry from their house to the hospital,
because neither beds nor any oxygen tank is left to save any precious life, with families dying to receive help.
People are dying in front of my eyes; all I could do was pray.
Today my efforts seem like a total waste. There are moments when I just feel like giving up,
but then I remember how far I've come. Today I have a family and a job to work for.
I feel nostalgic thinking about my teenage old self, who always found pride in helping others besides himself.
It was the day I found my purpose and pride; for me, service was all I abide.
Be it small, be it big, from helping an elderly to giving medicines to children freezing in the cold,
lending a helping hand was all I suffice.
Two doctors and five nurses have already sacrificed their lives in saving patients. Out of them, two were dearest of mine.
One was eagerly waiting to go back home for his daughter's birthday, but sadly he got admitted soon after his symptoms were spied,
and he died due to cardiac arrest the very next day.
The other was just a happy soul; he always had amazing jokes to tell. People loved his company, adults and kids alike.
But today, at their funeral, everything seemed so still and motionless.
The situation is getting worse day by day. On some days I carry unidentified bodies for their final cremation with no family to support.
It's been six months since I've met my family. With the deadly virus spreading in the air, my chances of survival are very negligible here.
But then, I look up in the sky, to remind myself that there is still some hope left. It's not completely over yet.
One day we will rise and shine bright; in addition to our strengths, when we all unite, we'll defeat this deadly virus in a single slice.
Seeking my mother's blessings from heaven, motivating me to never stop assisting people in their greatest time of misery,
even on my lowest days, when I'm concealed in a dark room of disparity and fear,
I can become the light of hope for people and make their worries disappear.
I certainly cannot help everyone, but just one more. With this thought, I confidently march on.
▸ Read QCEC 2023
As the Head of the Commonwealth, I stand before you today,
to open this international conference, where young voices hold sway.
The importance of youth in decision-making, close to my heart it lies,
for I once roamed the paths of learning, beneath regret's somber skies.
Once upon a time, in the embrace of youth's dreams untold, a tale of life's unfolding, a journey to behold.
I pondered purpose's call, destiny's elusive rhyme, to touch the hearts of all, to find my own sublime.
In the eyes of each young soul, I witness a radiant light, reminding me of my own endeavors, where I fell short despite.
Success and failure intertwined, like two sides of a coin, lost tokens of ambition, longing to be found and join.
Life, a cunning maestro, played its melody so sweet, in wisdom's gentle currents, a dance of joy complete.
"Let yourself wander," whispered the wind's gentle caress, to seek wonders untamed, where hidden treasures coalesce.
As a child, I believed in magic, within me it resided, dreaming of transforming the world, with a single blink, undivided.
Through open doors, fearlessly, I ventured with resolve, discovering pathways, distant and nearby, problems to solve.
But as I grew older, action seemed elusive, slipping through my grasp; distractions lured me away, my dreams fading like a fleeting gasp.
Looking back, I ponder if raising my voice could have made a change, if standing up for what's just and fair could have altered life's range.
In moments of despair, when surrender seems within reach, hold onto hope, let it tower above fears that breach.
Let faith soar high, with dreams as your guide, for the day you've awaited will soon arrive, side by side.
So, my little blue birds, keep chirping and whistling loud; celebrate your progress, reflect upon your journey, stand proud.
Trials and tests awaited, doors of challenge they revealed, yet humor, my steadfast ally, in wounds, joy concealed.
Life, not a solitary journey, nor a battle fought alone, a tapestry woven in harmony, where unity is known.
No need to change the world with solitary might, for life's symphony unfolds when we join hands and unite.
To all dreamers, I urge, let your passion be your guide; paint the world with hues, let your hearts' colors collide.
So go forth, dear ones, let passion be your beacon light, illuminate the world, with your radiant might.
For in the symphony of existence, where dreams and destinies align, leave your mark, create a legacy, and let your soul forever shine.
sustainabilitylow SES
Sprout
Sprout began as a sustainability project - an introduction to careers in climate change, and education about it, for underprivileged tier-2 and tier-3 college students. But when I was running the pre-workshops at two of those government schools, I realised the gap was still grassroots: quality education for children living in poverty - as opposed to rote academic tutoring, and the societal expectations of life set against the hard daily reality they face. Sprout became another way of understanding that - and everything keeps coming back to bringing curiosity back, whether through playful learning or designing a whole new curriculum.
See what Sprout is →
yes, that's me & a duck puppet 🦆
