Nitin Soni tells Prakriti Roy how he’s making the most of his passion of making a difference in the life of children
Even as a young adult, Nitin Soni’s father, who has done a lot of work for labourers, was an inspiration for him to do something for others. It was this inspiration that drove him to work with children who don’t have access to resources.
Born and brought up in Delhi’s Laxmi Nagar, Soni went to the Government Sarvodaya Vidyala near ITO and later went on to study his Bachelors in English Literature from Delhi University. The fact that a boy from a Hindi-medium school wanted to study English Literature raised a lot of eyebrows, but that didn’t deter him.
Soon after finishing college, Soni got involved with social work after working in a calling profile at HCL for just four months. He works as a consultant with Dharma Life, travelling to different areas of the country, conducting reading sessions with them and doing last mile campaigns. He also heads the Delhi chapter of the Kalam Library.
“Coming from a Government school, I know the kind of difficulties those children face and the lack of facilities. I want, as far as possible, to help children fulfill their ambitions,” Soni says. Through initiatives like Kalam Library, Soni seeks to open libraries in Government schools and slum schools. He believes that every child should have access to books and he even plans to rope in celebrities and prospective mentors to guide these children on their career paths.
Soni has also been using his English Literature training to write. He was the one who co-wrote the Kalam anthem. Recently, he also published a collection of poems called The Broken Boat. “The poems are about social issues like identity, love, abortion, begging and so on. I travel so much for my work and see the suffering of people up close, and I write about those things. Even my debut novel, which should be completed this year, is about a social issue that could be controversial,” he tells you. The purpose of his writings, Soni says, is to make people think and, in turn, think about others.
Social work is not something that many people opt for so early in their career, probably because there is no scope for making money. Even Soni had to face flak from relatives. He says: “They literally told me ‘Tujhse koi shaadi nahi karega’ because I opted to do this work. My happiness comes not from money but from the work I do and the joyful feeling I get by helping others.”
Soni knows that someone who is a “poet and social activist is perceived as boring and jobless”. But he says that his work is the thing that has helped him the most, whether it is for his personal development or his prowess as a writer.
“If you’ve read the play Waiting for Godot, you would know that the fundamental question is ‘Why do we exist’? I can guarantee that 99.9 per cent people won’t have an answer. But I do. I exist so that I can travel, write and work with children. I want to help children know why they exist and be sorted in their lives, like I am,” he asserts.
The article also got published in The Pioneer Newspaper – http://www.dailypioneer.com/sunday-edition/sunday-pioneer/backpack/the-young-changemaker.html
