The extras

“After many failed attempts for MBBS, I eventually pursued a Bachelor’s in Biotechnology followed by a Master’s as per convention. Considering I lacked exposure to research, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to pursue a PhD, so in order to build my knowledge and get hands-on-training experience, I initially decided to apply for a dissertation at CCMB, Hyderabad. I wrote to a couple of professors, whose work I liked but didn’t receive any response. Nevertheless, I decided to go and meet them in person and ended up getting kicked out by the security guard. Just when I was about to lose all hope, I bumped into a colleague of mine who was working at CCMB back then. He helped me through the formal procedure and I ended up securing a JRF position in the institute, under Prof. Rajan Sankaranarayanan.

The best part about the laboratory I joined was that my colleagues never bothered about how much I knew but were more interested in knowing how keen I was to learn new things. Initially, when I joined, I felt I wouldn’t fit in and wanted to leave. My friends convinced me to stay and I can now say that they did the right thing. The situation changed within a month. I started enjoying my work so much that I made up my mind of pursuing a PhD in the same laboratory, come what may. Having secured the DST INSPIRE fellowship, I had the opportunity of going to another institute but I had already made commitments to my supervisor and so I decided to…