Angels are on the Earth: How Two Students Lighted Others’ Lives

Can you imagine this? Two boys born in extremely backward villages with very difficult life, struggle to come to a city to gain education. While studying, they start teaching other needy students freely and light their lives!

Facts are Often Awesome Than Fictions

We want to introduce you to two young talents who are doing something what big people can never do. We are talking about Devji Sankhat and Lalit Rathod- two students from Gujarat who are serving other needy students by teaching them freely. This is what even earning people cannot do. Helping out other people actually contributes to your success. Let us check how they achieved happiness and real success by serving freely.

At first it was a nice experience for us to see two young students teaching other students. But we were surprised when we knew about the story of their own lives. We would first have a look on their lives to see how challenging their lives have been.

How Lalit Challenged Back His Challenging Life

Both Devji and Lalit were born in small, backward villages of Gujarat. Lalit was born on 10 November 1992 in a village called Chhalala in Gujarat. Chhalala is a very small village where people do not have even basic facilities like water supply and education. Living in small villages in India is really a struggle and life is very difficult there. Most people suffer of poverty and even starve for food.
Most teens living in rural areas have to give up study when they reach high school, because in most villages, even high school facility is not available. Mostly, teens have to start laboring at a very small age to support their parents financially. But after completing his primary school in Chhalala, Lalit moved to Limbdi, a little developed town to complete his further studies, while Lalit’s cousins and other family members had left studying. Education was never encouraged in his family. Lalit’s thoughts are often surprising and unique. He thinks different and learns at least something from others. Who says talented people come only from urban areas?

How a Boy Whose People Made Fun, Achieved Multiple Talents

Devji Sankhat was born in a small village called Una, Junagadh on May 17, 1993.

There is an interesting incident which led him to work hard to master language and public speaking skills. When he was in 8th standard, he wanted to give a speech in his school during a program. This was the first time he held the mic with his small, shivering hands.  Other students were making fun of him, what is this young child going to speak? He ended up- sadly not doing so well.

He decided to master speaking skills at that young age of 13, on his own hard work- without any direct coaching which you cannot even imagine in a small village. He started learning by reading books and practicing in front of a mirror and finally mastered speaking skills.

What is impossible for a willing mind and passionate heart? Gradually He started anchoring, hosting and speaking at school and college level programs at that young age. He became favorite student of his teachers. They wanted him to take part in all school activities due to his skills, despite he wanted to allot more time to his studies.

When in 11th class, Devji taught Gujarati language subject to his seniors- students of class 12! The reason was that the school did not have a teacher for that subject!

He was offered to take lecture in his own college where he is studying his graduation. He was also offered to work as a radio jockey in a leading radio station in Rajkot. But he denied those offers due to his studies and his objective to serve others.

Their Concept of Improving Learning Process

Teaching with learning improves the learning process, according to Jean-Pol Martin, who established a method for students to learn by teaching their peers.
Devji and Lalit are mainly running English language, public speaking and personality development seminars free of charge for needy students under the name Accept English, they have chosen such unique name for their campaign. Why did they choose English language? Most people coming from rural areas never get chance to learn English language, having used only their native language and due to lack of education. Most even do not know about importance of English language. They chose public speaking and personality development to help them improve confidence and stand in competitive environment of the developed cities; and also to change their thinking and attitude.

While Devji and Lalit are still studying, they have arranged free classes and seminars in various towns of Gujarat at Savarkundala, Rajkot and Limbdi.

Because they teach freely, it does not mean that students do not have to follow rules! They ask for regular attendance to all the students.  And along with that, they must also do their homework assigned- considering self-study as an important part of learning. We can never learn something without practicing ourselves. Thus, they conducted the classes systematically without compromising with rules.

Below is the brief summary of topics which they include in their seminars:

■ Goal setting and achievement
■ Public speaking
■ English- grammar, reading, writing, speaking, understanding, listening, vocabulary
■ Relation management
■ Time management – Learn to say “no”
■ Analysis of all day work
■ 100% work accuracy
■ Technique of how to prepare for competitive and other exams
■ Stress management
■ Interview techniques
■ Leadership
■ Marketing ourselves

Our Case Study and Great Results

We decided to case-study one of their seminars to check if it really benefited to the students or not. After a course of 20 days, a 30-marks test of English and personality development was conducted, in which students required to score 40% (12 marks) to pass. The seminar was conducted in the hostel in Rajkot city in which Devji and Lalit were also staying for their studies. 15 students who regularly attended the class gave the test. The students had little or no knowledge about English but they were somewhat interested in improving.

To our surprise, all the students passed the test! At the end of only 20-day short seminar, they really found significant improvement in their English.
The students who had fear of stage and public speaking, found themselves more confident. Some of the students also helped themselves to change thinking and attitude due to personality development course.

The seminars became hugely popular among the students. Students enjoyed it and requested them to start another batch! Isn’t that true success?