To make an impact in your home country
Summarize the ways in which your personal background has encouraged you to want to make an impact in your home country. You should indicate areas in which you have already contributed, such as having overcome any personal or community barriers to higher education.
"Thousands have lived without love, not one without water". These were the words spoken by me in a seminar at my university which was about water scarcity and management in rural Punjab. I was attending that as a university student who had developed a strong understanding of water management.
Digging back to when it started, it was 2008 and a mighty flood had taken our everything including the roof of our head. My father insisted me to leave school and help him in growing the crops again. I started working in the fields and somehow managed my high school studies also, but nature had planned to roast us. During the next 2 years, not even a single drop of water falling at our farms. We were literally droughted as irrigation channels never flowed. That was the first time I got introduced to water management.
After high school, I managed to join a Polytechnique and completed a diploma in Civil technology with flying colours. Next, I sat in the entrance exams and got admission to the university. The news of my selection came when I had just lost my father due to cardiac arrest. Now, I was on crossways. The easy route was to quit my education and start earning, the difficult one was to continue pursuing my university dream in parallel to earn a livelihood for my family. You can easily guess what I did, yes, I decided to take the bumpy road. I am the first person to have a university degree in my family.
I don't want to cook stories how I worked hard, rather I worked smart and by the grace of Almighty, I won the Vice chancellor's award followed by a scholarship from the government. Now, when all the financial burdens were eased, I focused completely on my education. Besides good grades, I tried to address the subjects completely by regularly attending seminars and conferences related to water. It has also made me self-confident and come up as a better human being.
Due to my interest in irrigation and agriculture, I started volunteering in societies related to water and irrigation. One of them was the 'Youth in agriculture' initiative. On that forum, we discussed and find solutions to the problems which were faced by small farmers. Due to my farming background, I was assigned to visit sites and propose feasible solutions. It greatly helped me in understanding the grass-root problems.
This exposure led me to step forward and I started a platform 'Young farmers association of Pakistan' to address young farmers. Unfortunately, this brainchild didn't grow due to some unforeseen reasons. However, my contribution to YIA is still continued and I am glad It is making an impact on farmer's lives.
It is pertinent to mention that my current job is nowhere related to my interest and past experiences. However, I have understood the working style of the government departments and groomed myself personally. I am confident that my experience here will land me a job in the irrigation or water department upon my return after postgraduation from the UK.
