‘Try and try until you succeed’, is indeed a popular phrase to reflect upon, but how many of us actually follow it? The natural tendency to give up after facing failure a couple of times often takes over a person’s will to keep striving for their dreams. But such wasn’t the case with UPSC aspirant Shelly Rathi, who kept on pursuing her dream even after failing four consecutive times.
Today, Indian Masterminds presents Shelly’s story of not letting failures come in the way of her civil services dream and finally achieving it in her fifth attempt.
EARLY LIFE
Shelly used to live with her family in the Kharhar village of Bahadurgarh Tehsil in the Jhajjar district of Haryana. Her father, Satish Rathi, is a farmer and her mother Sundar Rathi is a homemaker. The family lived in the village for a while, but when her father realized that there were no good schools in the village where his children could receive a quality education, he decided to leave the village with his family and move to Bahadurgarh, to provide better education to his kids.
He admitted all three of his children – two daughters and a son – into good schools immediately so that they could receive the quality education that they deserved. While the father toiled hard in the fields, Shelly left no stone unturned in studying hard.
EDUCATION
She completed her schooling at PDM Public School in the district and became the district topper in class 10th board examination. She again stood first in her entire school in the class 12th board examination. She also topped her university during her graduation in B.Tech and received a gold medal for her academic excellence.
She took admission in IIT Delhi in 2017 to complete her M.Tech. It was during this time that she started remembering her uncle’s words. As a little girl, she was always encouraged by her uncle to study hard and become a DM one day.
While studying to complete her M.Tech, Shelly realized that she indeed wished to enter civil services and become a DM. She knew she would be able to solve not only her family’s problems but also her district’s and her people’s problems if she became an IAS officer. She made up her mind to give the UPSC examination and began preparing for it, while still studying at IIT.
UPSC JOURNEY
Her family completely supported her with whatever she needed during her preparation. They believed in her immensely and knew in their hearts that Shelly would do something big and bring honor to their family. Shelly on her part prepared with full dedication and gave her examinations. However, fate had other plans for her.
She was confident that she could clear the examination, but unfortunately, she was not able to clear even the preliminary stage of the UPSC CSE. This happened not once, not twice, but four times! Imagine her level of disappointment, when she failed on the same stage, four consecutive times!
However, Shelly’s family was right by her side all throughout. They kept on motivating her and encouraging her to give the examination again and again. Shelly herself strengthened her will and decided to give the examination for the fifth time in the year 2020.
VICTORY AT LAST
Instead of going to Delhi and studying in expensive coaching institutes for preparation, she decided to take her friends’ help with the preparation. Her friends were also preparing for UPSC, and together, they discussed ideas and motivated each other to go ahead. These group study sessions helped her a lot.
She revised her entire syllabus as many times as she could. She also took help from previous years’ question papers and went through them thoroughly. She gave numerous mock tests before the examination and put all her hard work into clearing the exam this time.
And her hard work and efforts didn’t go in vain. After failing four times, Shelly finally cleared the UPSC CSE in the year 2020 and bagged the All India Rank of 308.
A HAPPY FAMILY
While talking to the media, Shelly shared, “I still can’t believe I passed the UPSC exam. Our family is more excited than I am, and that makes me proud of myself. I’m happy that I was able to achieve something that would make them proud. They gave me everything without considering whether I would ever be able to repay them or not.”
Her father, Satish Rathi, expressed his happiness before the media by saying, “I don’t care the slightest about her rank. I’m ecstatic about her achievement. A parent is proud of their child at all times. It made me happy that when I was occupied with farming, my children were working hard in school. She did self-study and believed in herself.”
Her mother, Sundari Rathi, shared: “She has fulfilled my goal. I was concerned about her health since she studied at all hours of the day and night. She had put off sitting the UPSC test for two months earlier in 2019, but she has now returned. We never told her not to follow her heart.”
With her inspiring achievement, Shelly brought laurels not just to her immediate family, but to her entire village, and also to her district, and state.
