Daijiworld Media Network

Koppal, Aug 18: At 27, when most people are busy establishing their careers and trying to get ahead in life, here is a software engineer who has made it his mission to put the lesser fortunate on the path of success, through education.

Rajesh Bhat with his 'Head Held High Foundation' in Koppal district of Karnataka, has been changing lives of young villagers in an innovative way.

Koppal is one of the most backward districts in Karnataka and the main purpose of the foundation is to to turn the illiterate villagers into BPO employees.

Rajesh aims to ensure that youngsters in villagers are able to stand on their own feet and live with dignity.

Rajesh earlier had a tech job with a good salary at Onmobile, a Bangalore based company. He gave up the job and along with his mentor Sunil Savara started the venture and trained eight people initially.

After achieving the initial success, Rajesh and his friends then opened the centre in Koppal. At the centre, students are taught English, Mathematics, logic, life skills and the basics of personal grooming.

"We did something called village reach programme where people we trained went back to their villages and trained 900 kids in 31 different villages," Rajesh told CNN-IBN.

Yankamma, a fruit seller and domestic help, today gives lessons in English to her son. She had earlier come to the centre in search of a job.

The centre has so far reached 113 students who get inducted into the BPO setup at the centre itself.

About his plans for the centre, Rajesh told, "In 2011, we're looking at training 500 people from two different states. Our intention is to see whether we can work in the 100 most backward districts in India."