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How did a Kerala security guard emerge as a Malayalee role model?

Dubai - Ranjith Ramachandran overcomes financial challenges to join IIM, Ranchi, as an assistant professor

Ranjith Ramachandran, 28, is the new poster boy of India. He has emerged as a novel role model for the world’s second-most populous country.

His inspirational tale couldn't have occurred at a more opportune time when

India is in grips of the second and, perhaps, the worst phase of Covid-19. The daily recorded cases are breaking new records amid panic and fear about the contagion that has roiled the economy and wreaked havoc on people’s lives.

But Covid-19 impact can be on hold for the moment, as Ramachandran., who worked as a night watchman in his native Kerala, took centrestage.

He kept his dream and burnt the midnight oil to graduate from the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras.

Now, he has become an Assistant Professor at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ranchi.

His is a tale of fighting adverse circumstances and coming up trumps in life." An IIM professor was born here," reads his post on a social media platform, which is accompanied by a picture of his rundown tiled hut covered with a tarpaulin sheet to prevent rainwater from seeping in.

The post has gone viral.

Kerala’s Finance Minister T M Thomas Isaac congratulates Ramachandran, who goes by the name ''Ranjith R Panathoor'' on social media.

Ramachandran was working as a night watchman at a Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) telephone exchange at Panathur in his native Kasaragod district, Kerala. He pursued his Economics degree from Pious Xth College in Kasaragod.

Later, he got into IIT, Madras, where he found it difficult to study as he knew only Malayalam. But his indomitable will helped him earn his doctorate last year, despite the linguistic challenges. He was an Assistant Professor at Christ University, Bengaluru in the past two months.

His father is a tailor, and his mother is a daily wage worker under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme