Most of us know what it feels like to prepare generously for something and still not get it, be it an exam, an interview or a dream job that can take years of effort, yet the results do not turn out in our favour!People rarely come out hopeful of such situations when life throws lemons at us.But a 30-year-old woman turned the speed bumps in her life into motivation after failing at 6 attempts in UPSC and helps educate nearly 900 rural children
Meet Shruti Shrivastava: After six UPSC attempts, she restarted at 30 and now helps 900 rural children learn.
Shruti Shrivastava grew up in several Madhya Pradesh towns because of her parents’ transferable government jobs. She studied philosophy at Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi and spent years preparing for the Civil Services Examination.According to The Better India, in six attempts, she cleared four preliminary exams and reached the interview stage once. But in April 2024, the UPSC results ended a dream she had carried for nearly a decade. She said, “The UPSC journey ended the day my years-long dream shattered. For the next few weeks, I was trying to hold myself together and come to terms with the fact that the life I had imagined for so many years was no longer going to happen,” adding becoming a civil servant was never the final goal, but it was a path for working towards the society.She spent the next few months recovering, but “restarting life at the age of 30 wasn’t easy. I was nervous because I was beginning from scratch.”
A second start with a friends left behind venture
Around that time, the Sashaktikaran Foundation in Jaipur was close to shutting down. Her college friend Mrinalika Rathore had founded it in March 2017, but after she joined the IAS, there was no one to run it. In July 2024, Mrinalika offered Shruti the chance to take over; this is how Shruti came to lead the foundation.“It was emotional in many ways because she isn’t just a friend; she is someone whose values closely match mine. We had spoken about how she would work from within the government while I would continue working outside it, so taking over the foundation felt like continuing a shared vision,” Shruti explains to Better India.Her sister Smriti later joined as co-director, and education professional Adarsh Mohandas became co-founder and programme director.
Next was project Neev and understanding the problems
When Sashaktikaran Foundation restarted in July 2024, Shruti’s parents stepped in with money before any donations came through.Shruti knew she needed help. Years of UPSC preparation had left her with a basic understanding; “I had become a generalist”, she said and understood the issues well, but she needed someone with real expertise in education to build a programme that could make a difference.That person was Adarsh Mohandas. He came up with the idea that became Project Neev. As co-founder and programme director, he runs the work on the ground, while Shruti looks after strategy, fundraising and building the organisation.After visiting villages and classrooms, the team found that teachers in many schools managed several grades at once, with little time for any single child. “Government schools educate the majority of rural children, so creating another system may help a few, but strengthening the existing public system is what creates lasting change,” she says.And realised that the problem was not a lack of commitment but a lack of time, resources and infrastructure. Project Neev was launched in October 2024, and fieldwork began on 14 November.
How it works
Groups of five children leave class for a 30-minute session with a Shiksha Saathi. Each child uses a tablet running Chimple, a learning app developed by the Sutara Foundation, which picks up from where the child stopped the previous day.According to a Logical Indian report, the foundation’s Project Neev reaches around 900 children across 10 government schools and nine residential hostels.
Women from the villages also help in
The Shiksha Saathis are women from the same villages, and Shruti did not make a degree compulsory. They are tested, interviewed, and trained, then mentored monthly and today, 30 women work as Shiksha Saathis.
The organisation works in collab with MP government
The foundation also works with three departments of the Madhya Pradesh government, including Education, Tribal Affairs, and Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Communities.Apart from this, she wants to build projects around women’s livelihoods and around children from denotified and nomadic communities.Shruti says, “We don’t want to touch lives briefly and move on,” adding, “we want depth. We want longevity. We want children to become confident, critical thinkers and self-learners, and we want women to become leaders in their own communities.”
