“I am proud to be the Youngest True IUITE of i3. I cannot thank i3 enough for having given me the purpose of my life” says Keerthana MR, a first year engineering student from Vemana Institute of Technology, who has gained double the maturity of what a student of her age would generally carry. She has found her purpose to live, and dreams to stand as an example for people who are of her age, and make them believe age does not matter, for someone who dreams big!

Keerthana grew up like every other normal kid, but, the uniqueness in her, was the ability to grasp fast, from what she learned. She was never worried about her exams during her school days, where she would prepare only a day prior to her examinations and come out with great results. She has been in the list of toppers throughout her schooling, but missed to get a 90 percent in her 10^th grade, with a very few marks. She felt she had lost everything when she failed to score what she aimed for and this was the first time ever, she couldn’t reach her goal. She was encouraged by her family to do better in her further classes and she continued to prepare well for her 12^th grade, which is considered to be the most important part of a student’s life to build a good career. She was preparing well for her exams, but could not give her hundred percent in what she did. While half the academic year had passed by, she got a “golden opportunity” she says, to meet the international youth icon, who is an international speaker and a serial entrepreneur, Mr. Sujit Lalwani, who shared his time with her, to bring her back to focus.

Now, it was the time she attended her exams and would wait for the results. Everyone were curious to know if she could score the marks that she dreamt to achieve from her childhood days, but, she was confident enough that she would score above 90 percent, which turned into reality and she happened to score a 94 percent in her examinations. “I am extremely thankful to Sujit  sir who shared his time to help me that day, which made me get my dream scores! I am also thankful to Bharath GC sir, who guided me at every step, whenever I was low and whenever I was in need of someone who could help me in tough situations” she adds. Her exams completed and she was waiting for this day, since she wanted to be a part of the platform i3 (i3 - influence, inspire, impact - A platform that helps the youth get right direction to help build a good career for themselves), founded by Mr. Sujit Lalwani. She couldn’t enroll earlier since she had to complete her board exams. Now was the time she had to attend her Common Entrance Test, to join professional courses. She prepared for her exams, but, this time she couldn’t score marks as high as her 12^th grade results. She did not worry about it since she knew she could still achieve with the help of a platform like i3.

She started attending conferences at i3, where she got an opportunity to meet personalities from various backgrounds who have achieved great heights. She recalls, “I was always inspired by Ashok Shankar Rathode sir, founder of OSCAR Foundation, who is the reason to have changed lives of thousands of slum kids. One of the major reasons for me to join i3 was him, because, I knew what kind of people I would meet and learn from. I got connected to more achievers. I must mention about Chetan Yellapurkar sir, founder of Mark Your Trails and adventor.co, who instilled the dream of travel and adventure, in me. Every counsellor made us realise that life is not worth living if we do not have a purpose. They told us, why it is important to involve in the society. They taught us how important is a citizen’s role, in the country’s development. More than anything, we learned how to dream BIG and how we could achieve our dreams”.

Keerthana happened to impact more than 15,000 people through the social projects she executed. “iUY2C is one of my favourite projects where I happened to inspire the students of government schools. I impacted thousands of children through the project. I enhanced my skills to communicate better and also understood how important it is, to help these kids to help grow our economy” she says. She was chosen to be one of the best performers in executing projects like iUY2C, iUOSB - One Sided Book project where sheets which were blank on one side were collected, bound into books to be donated to government school children and she collected about 37,000 one sided sheets in a matter of 7 days. As she executed such projects, her views about life changes. Finally, the day came when she was tagged as the True IUITE of i3 season 3, Bangalore, where she was recognised for her performance through her impact numbers. She became the reason to organize an inspirational talk in her college, during the first few days of her, joining the college. She believes in sharing opportunities with others. This young little girl speaks of her vision for her country, “My vision is to help more children get the right education and also, right direction to lead their lives. I wish to be a leader who can create more leaders”.