Despite being cheated upon and rejected multiple times, Arunabh became a Software Developer and is now living his best life
Son of an Indian Air Force Officer, 27-year-old Arunabh Singh had to change multiple schools because of his father’s frequent transfers. While he admits that he had been a naughty kid in his childhood, he also admits that he had been a mediocre student who would pass with an average of 60–65% and spend most of his time engaging in activities like writing, painting, or playing sports like cricket and football. In fact, in class 9th, he went on to play football on a national level and brought a lot of recognition for himself and dreamt of becoming a sports person or a sports teacher through Delhi University.
It was in class 10th when he scored 85% in his board exams to his parents’ surprise & they then urged him to take the Science stream. It is a common notion in a country like ours that top scorers should opt for tough subjects and then go for a traditional course like engineering or medicine — something his parents too wanted for their child. Arunabh contemplated if being a sportsperson would bring him a stable career as opposed to engineering or not and after weighing the pros and cons, decided to go ahead with Physics, Chemistry and Maths as his major subjects.
After completing his schooling, he consulted an uncle of his who resided in the UAE about the field he should go for to pursue B.Tech. His uncle had been doing well as a Civil Engineer and encouraged him to opt for the same because of the numerous opportunities it could bring to his doorstep. Following his advice, he took admission in Civil Engineering and decided to give the best to his studies. He studied so dedicatedly that by the end of his final year, he managed to break the record of the top scorers of his college and became the best student the college had seen in the last 14 years!
However, things after college didn’t go as smooth as he expected them to. He says:
“Even though I performed well in college, I wasn’t able to get any job the next 3–4 months after graduating. My father couldn’t tolerate my restlessness and helped me get a job at a company in Faridabad through his personal contacts. The company hired me at a salary of Rs.6000 per month, which could hardly even cover my travel expenses but I had no other option except to go with the flow. However, after 3 months, I realised that I didn’t deserve to be underpaid like this for the workload I was carrying on my shoulders. I quit the job and started looking for something else.”
Unfortunately, demonetisation hit just after & affected engineers who hailed from fields like Mechanical, Electrical and Civil. After struggling for some months, he found a work opportunity as a Site Instructor at a local firm in Bhilai, Chhattisgarh. After working there with a heavy heart for 7 months, he only received a salary of only 1 month as the company suffered from financial constraints.
Worried by the things that were happening to him, his sister invited him to stay with her in Bengaluru where she was completing her studies and take a break. After spending some time in the city, he felt that instead of sitting idle, he could utilise his time in studying further. He decided to prepare for the CAT exam and began studying for it. Same time, he realised that his father was about to retire in the next 2 years — which meant that he had to take the monetary matters of his family into his hands as early as possible. Thereby, he stopped his preparation in between as knew a course like MBA would require him to study for 2 years at least. He now needed something that could bring him some financial stability within the next few months. Following this situation, he briefly joined a local college in Bengaluru as a lecturer of Civil Engineering but left it after a few months because they too held his salary like his previous employers and couldn’t pay him anything. With this, Arunabh felt so unmotivated that he decided to give up on Civil Engineering altogether and try out a different field.
After consulting some of his friends who were doing well in their respective careers, he found out that Software Development was an illustrious field with a bright future. Despite not having done any relevant studies, he got to know that there were certain institutes and coaching centres running in Bengaluru that taught coding to people like him with a non-Computer Science background within a short span of time. Without much further ado, he joined one such coaching centre and began to learn the fundamentals of coding through mediums like printed notes and digital presentations. Within 9 months, he was equipped with a lot of theoretical knowledge and prepared himself for the placement interviews that the coaching centre had promised to its students.
However, problems didn’t seem to end in Arunabh’s life. He says:
“It seemed like no one wanted to hire me because of my background in Civil Engineering and the gap that I had in my resume. After a lot of waiting, a company based out of the outskirts of Bengaluru approached the coaching centre and shortlisted my resume along with some of my fellow batchmates’ who were facing the same problem as me. During our interview, we were asked to sign a bond of 2 years that required our original documents for the finalisation of the job. Sceptical but desperate at the same time, I decided to go ahead and submitted my documents to them. However, within a few days, I realised that it was a scam and this company used to target people like me with a gap year to fill in those years with experience of big companies like Genpact, HCL, etc. and then take a commission from the coaching centre which would show these resumes in its testimonials to attract more students and take high fees from them to mend their failed careers.”
When Arunabh went back to collect his original document, the company asked for a ransom of Rs.50,000 from him following the failure of which, according to that company, he would be blacklisted from all the other companies. As he had already given up on Civil Engineering, he decided to let it be and leave all his documents with them to get out of this whole mess.
Now shattered from within, he lost all his hopes of having a proper career and felt highly dejected with whatever that had happened with him in all these years. Maybe it was his fate that still didn’t want him to give up even now, & he stumbled upon an article in the Times of India that introduced him to Masai School and the ‘pay after placement’(ISA) it offered to aspiring Software Developers. Having been scammed before, he did thorough research, and found out that it was indeed a genuine cause where he didn’t have to pay any fees unless he would get a high paying job in a relevant field! He went ahead to apply and cleared the entrance exam and interview process to be selected as a student at Masai.
“It was one of the best decisions I ever made in my life. From all the bad experiences I had faced to date, I was very doubtful that I wouldn’t be able to do anything right again. However, on the first day itself, I realised that Masai would prove to be helpful for me- in the previous coaching centre, we were asked to memorise the notes and just read about HTML- but here, we were told to open our laptops and apply what we had just learnt through coding. It was a totally new practice for me. With this, I knew I was at the right place now as all the mentors were always in constant touch to clear my doubts, my inhibitions and uplift my spirit when I had almost given up on life being rejected from everywhere. The discipline and sincerity with which the team worked truly touched me and I would request everyone who feels as lost as I was, to give a chance to Masai and see their life change for the better,” he says.
Today, Arunabh is a Software Engineer at Revv and continues to follow his passion for football. He is a true inspiration for all those who feel hindered by the failures they have faced in life- they must know that there indeed is a light at the end of a long tunnel and all they need to do is keep walking towards it, just how he did.
