ANJALI RATHNAM

A girl who was once rejected by her own family is now an accepted child in cherish. This is the journey of my life. Life always gives 2nd chances and that became possible with the introduction of cherish foundation in my life.

2 decisions changed my life completely. I was just 2years old, when my parents were divorced and my father was asked to make a 1st choice, it was either me or his family because of various reasons. But eventually to my surprise, he rejected me and that was the most hurtful situation for me because I always thought that my father is the world to me. Nevertheless, my mother chose me. She left her marital house. While Leaving she just said,” one day this girl will make me proud'' . she worked hard as a tailor for some days to meet the daily expenses and provided me with a good education. But all of a sudden my mother made a 2nd decision i,e 2nd marriage. She married another person. This particular decision switched my life completely. Soon after a few days, she gave birth to another girl child. Gradually I felt that the love she had for me is fading off. But unexpectedly my stepfather passed away due to cancer. His demise tragically affected the entire family as he was the only breadwinner of the family. It resulted in the sudden fall of a family. Moreover, my mother lost every hope and on the other side, at that moment she felt me as a burden as she couldn't afford my education or meet my basic needs.

And that was the time I came to cherish when I was 7 years old and this was when my real-life journey began. Cherish has transformed my life and made me realize that I am not alone in this world. In Fact, It gave me enough courage to face the world. Here in cherish, I have got a wonderful family. Now I can confidently say that cherish will always be with me no matter how difficult the situation could be. It has nurtured me, taught me the way to lead life and to tackle any kind of challenges that I come across. From the bottom of my heart, I want to thank God for giving me a loving daddy and caring brothers and sisters. whenever I call Mr David Subramanyam as my dad, there is always a great feeling that you have at least one person who is always there for you to never let you down. Now I realize that a family can not only be made by blood relation but can also be made by choice.

EDUCATION

Cherish always prioritized education, it gave us the best education in the top schools of the city. I started my education in cherish from 4th class. As I am from Telugu medium school, initially it became difficult for me to cope up with studies in English medium. I used to get very few marks and teachers made a strong impression on me that I can't study well but somehow I worked hard on my basics and gradually scored good marks. So from 7th class, I started to get a class topper, from then on I never turned back. I secured a 9.5 CGPA in my SSC and was given an academic excellence certificate. I scored 97% in my intermediate and stood as the college topper. Now I completed my graduation in B.Sc (Physical sciences) from St.Pious X degree college in September 2021 with 9.3 CGPA and was awarded a merit certificate. I am always indebted to cherish all the things it is providing me. I secured 33rd rank in PG entrance. Now I am pursuing MSc in Physics from Osmania University. So in the future, I want to become an IAS OFFICER and make cherish foundation proud.

It was during my preparation for civils , I realized that there are so many vulnerable people and there so much disorder in the society that needs a change to be done by people like us.

Becoming IAS gives a great opportunity to serve in great majority and there is always real satisfaction when we use our authority to bring justice to the poor and be responsible citizen.

Once I was traveling in a city bus and I was waiting for everyone to get down as I was scared that they would scold me if I went before them and by the time everybody got down the bus left the station where I needed to get down. Then I realized that life is not only about compromising but you have to push yourself out to face the challenge. So cherish made me a strong and independent person. I was once a very shy girl and introvert but now I can confidently speak before crowds and interact with people. On the whole, cherish made 3 R's in my life. It restored my life, removed the breeches from negative things that happened in my life and finally rebuilt my life.