The New Indian Express ·
Soldiering towards a dream: Major helps Tamil Nadu youth find a path to the armed forces
VILLUPURAM: A career in the military can begin with a spectacle — a ceremonial march, a fighter jet slicing through the sky, a flag rising against the morning light. But for many students, it begins more quietly; with the discovery that there is an examination they can write, an application they can fill out, and a future they had never been taught to picture for themselves.
That discovery has become the centre of a growing classroom-to-career effort across Tamil Nadu and Puducherry. It reaches students from government schools, rural homes and ordinary middle-class families, offering not a shortcut into the armed forces, but a clear direction.
At the heart of the effort is Major Gaurav Mishra, a retired Army officer whose post-retirement mission is to guide youngsters towards officer-level careers in the Army, Navy and Air Force. Through what he calls the ‘Veera Tamil Nadu Movement’, he hopes to make the uniform feel less like a distant emblem and more like an attainable calling.
