Sri. Bala Nagendran, IAS is born visually challenged. His mother is a home maker, father
was in Indian army and later worked for United India Insurance company, his
elder brother works for United India Insurance as well and younger brother
placed in a private firm.
When his
father was working for Indian Army, he met a visually impaired person who introduced him to Little Flower convent, which is dedicated school for
educating visually challenged kids and thus Bala Nagendran got enrolled in Little Flower
Convent. There started his journey in schooling. He was basically a very
aspirant child and used to be curious, asking lots of questions to his
teachers, which in turn encouraged the teachers to attend to hidden needs.
Teachers also advised his parents to never stop his education.
He
finished his preliminary studies at Little Flower convent and moved to St.
Louis at Adyar for his further school studies, where he completed his 10th
standard. On completion of that, he did
a collaborative program at Ramakrishna Mission school at T.Nagar for completing
his 12th standard. He finished his under
graduation in Bachelors of Commerce
(BCom) at Loyola College.
In 2010,
his life took a new turn, when he joined Manidha Neyam, an organization that
helps visually challenged people to prepare for IAS (Indian Administrative
Services) coaching. It’s so truly said “Constant dripping hollows out a
stone.” His constant search for knowledge
was identified by his teacher, Ms.
Catherine, when he was as young as 6yrs old. She got inspired by his questions
and in turn encouraged and aspired him to be an IAS officer, for his abundant
knowledge. She fed his inquisitive mind with details about IAS and its significance. And finally it is Manidha Neyem which helped him achieve his goals
to become an IAS officer.
He has
been with that organization since 2010 and on his fifth attempt, he cleared the IAS
exams, which wasn’t an easy one. At the
age of 26, and hurdles like visual impairment, it is an applauding achievement indeed.
Inspite of having undergone so many hardships, he considers himself to be lucky
technologically, since he has access to Computer equipped screen reader called
JAWS – Job access with speech. This software helped him with browsing the internet
and he is proficient with Braille too. He feels that he is fortunate to be
surrounded with inspiring people like teachers, professors, parents and
close friends, who were there at the time of his need.
An
important role model he mentions is Dr. Roman Saini (He is an Indian educator,
motivational speaker and was one of the youngest IAS officers, before he
resigned. Saini was previously posted as Asst Collector in Madhya Pradesh.) who started online free coaching classes for
IAS preparation for under privileged. He also values Mr. Armstrong, who laid a
100km road in Thailand without the help from the Government. These two great
people have influenced his life to a greater extent.
Bala
Nagendran has specialized in Sociology and Public Administration, his
specialization in IAS being Public Administration. When asked about his interest in
Public administration, he said his focus is on decentralization of education, which
plays a main role in eradication of poverty.
He is
extremely grateful to that unknown person who guided his father to the little
flower convent, which has helped him achieve his goals and made his dreams come
true. He also advises that there are no short cuts to success and never to lose
faith. He also wants to emphasize that confidence is very important to achieve
goals and particularly self-confidence, which is believing in yourself. He also
advices people like him with disabilities, that anything can be achieved with
persistence, confidence and most of all faith.
Now, on his
personal side, he loves books and he spends his spare time reading books, like
fiction and non-fiction. He plays chess online with his friends, writes about
social issues in Facebook and other social media websites. He used to play
keyboard until he was 7yrs old, then he had to quit to focus more on studies.
When
asked him about his contact with Lit the Light, he said it was through WhatsApp,
Mr. Barath contacted him. He wasn’t using mobile phone from 2013 and started
using again from May, 2016.
When
asked about what is missing or what can fill the gaps for a visually challenged
person, he says social inclusion and rights based approach. Education,
marriage, kids, adoption are something which he considers that visually
challenged people should not fight for. He also mentions that there should be a
social change where everybody should be included equally. He is also happy to
see that visually impaired people working in banking sectors, and Robotics, etc,
which is very inspiring for the future generations.
We hereby
thank Mr. Bala Nagendran, IAS for his time for the Lit The Light, and thanking
the Lit the Light organization for an opportunity to meet an inspiring person
like him. We wish him all the best in all his future endeavors and hope to see
more such people who could be role models for the society.
Article by Chandra
