NRI returns with poll hope

Source: Mail Today

Foreign- educated Bihar youngster junks plush UK job for nation

AKSHAY VERMA is not a run- ofthe- mill candidate. The foreigneducated youngster left a lucrative career abroad to contest the Lok Sabha elections with a dream to bring about change in his home state Bihar.

With a masters degree in financial economics from Oxford University and in public administration from Columbia under his belt, the 28- year- old founder president of the Sarvjan Kalyan Loktantrik Party ( SKLP) used to work as an investment banker with the UBS Investment Bank in London.

Akshay, who did his B. A. ( Honours) in mathematics from St. Stephen’s, Delhi, in 2007, said he became acquainted with the various problems of the people while doing social work in his constituency.

“I decided to contest the polls on realising that it would provide us a platform to reach out to our target groups in a much more effective manner,” he said.

Keen on changing the lives of the poor especially the fishermen, Akshay wanted to improve their living conditions by creating an environment of education and employment for the youths. He realised that he had to do his bit for society by helping the poor who were fighting for basic rights in Muzaffarpur.

Son of former Muzaffarpur district magistrate Amitabh Verma, Akshay went on to facilitate bank loans worth ` 3.75 crore to more than 1,000 fishermen of different blocks of Muzaffarpur and got 5,800 of them covered under insurance schemes. In the last two years, he was also instrumental in bringing two investors from Delhi to set up a project in fish seed production in Bochaha block of Muzaffarpur. Besides, he helped set up 112 self- help groups for the uplift of poor women in eight blocks of Muzaffarpur and adjoining Darbhanga district.

A native of Banauli village in Darbhanga district, Akshay is confident of leaving a mark in the parliamentary elections. The SKLP leader, who set up his party shortly before filing his nomination papers in Muzaffarpur on April 17, has fielded young candidates from Sheohar, East Champaran, and Khagaria constituencies.