Meet Sajad Mehraj, a 19-year-old, who used to run a bread stall on the street in Kashmir’s Kupwara district has cracked NEET UG by scoring 650 out of a total of 720 marks. He achieved this feat by managing his time by making dough on the stall and plugging in his phone for online lectures, all at the same time.
Once demotivated by someone in school who said “Patri pe Naan bechane wale ko school mei kyu aane dete hai, ye school mei aakar kya hi kar lenge”. (Why allow street sellers to enter the school, what would they achieve by doing so)”, Sajad has paved the way for many medical aspirants. Countering the narrative Sajad’s sister who is the first doctor from the village motivated him by asking him “to prove everyone wrong by cracking the exam.” This eventually led him to become the first male doctor in his village.
“I studied online from the Yakeen batch of Physics Wallah for my NEET preparation. Biology NCERT was taught by my elder sister. I planned my days in such a way that I could work on the cart while simultaneously attending online lectures. My evenings were reserved for revision, solving DPPs, and taking tests. Consistently following this routine helped me clear the exam,” Sajad told News18.
The teenager worked 7-8 hours daily on the stall and cooked about 300 naans all while attending online lectures on NEET. His daily work commenced at 4 AM and he returned home late evening by 7 PM. Sajad recalls running the footwear and crockery stall along with his brother ever since he was in fourth grade. By the time he reached class 8, his father’s illness had worsened the family’s financial situation, pushing him to start his own stall of selling naan.
However, this didn’t demotivate the young boy and he topped the local cluster in class 8 and won the scholarship by Kashmir Education Initiative in class 9. He recalls there was a discounted course by Physics Wallah worth Rs 2000. Sajad’s school’s headmaster purchased this batch for him to pursue his dream of becoming a doctor.
Sajad is currently a second-year MBBS student at GMC, Srinagar. Sajad shares that his father is a 10th-class pass-out, but still, he never stopped his children from studying. He remembers once a neighbor asked his father to abandon his sister’s studies, but his father let her study and she became the first doctor of the village, and Sajad became the second one.
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