Within just 3 months, Pass Karado has more than 2500 registered users and an average of 2000 page visits daily. The company helps bridge the gap of the education asymmetry in India so that everyone has access to knowledge, all in one place, totally FREE of cost.
The folks at PassKarado are working hard to eliminate the education asymmetry in India and provide Indian students with all the academic material of various universities, colleges and with the college, job and internship reviews of various companies so that students can plan which firm or college to go to. “Pass karado” is a Hindi word which is chanted like a hymn on the exam eve. It literally means “help me clear the paper!”
Manu Jain, one of the many founders of Pass Karado took a break from his busy schedule to tell us about what it means to be a “surfing freak,” and why you shouldn’t be disheartened if your idea is stolen by someone else.
Tell us about your team.
We were seven college friends who founded it and now the team has expanded to 16 members.
Our Founders Include:
- Manu Jain: Electrical Engg. NIT Jaipur
- Devendra Sharma: Electrical Engg.: NIT Jaipur
- Pranay Agrawal: Electrical Engg.: NIT Jaipur
- Mukesh Kumar: Computer Science.: NIT Jaipur
- Suprabhat Sen: Information Technology: NIT Jaipur
- Ayush Jain: Electrical Engg.: NIT Jaipur
- Ankit Gupta: Electrical Engg.: NIT Jaipur
How long have you been involved with the internet?
I was gadget friendly from childhood and was gifted with a desktop at the age 11 which is quite early for an Indian child. I thank my dad who understood the importance of keeping me updated with technologies. Since then, I remain a movie and surfing freak!
What time do you usually start work each day? Do you have an office or work at home?
We have a team of students who are from different cities so we don’t have anything like an office as we all work at home. We love to work as a team and keep ourselves updated through internet and phone. We discuss present and future plans with each other before implementing so that pass karado remains a students’ initiative.
What’s the first thing you do when you leave the office at the end of the day?
As we work from our homes, we are free to discuss things 24/7 but even when we are not working, we keep on thinking about the advancements and new implements that can be done to our website. Whether what we are doing is still significant as a students’ initiative or not is the first thing that trickles our minds. We all think this startup as a medium to share knowledge and not as a business.
When do your best ideas come to you?
Gloom of the dark night at 4am, when I come out of the room to drink water, the darkness brings me a glowing idea to work on! Passing through the streets to buy some eatables, I hear students talking, and their problems get me the topics to ponder over and help! The shining and emerging India motivates me to make it even faster at growth! Ideas linger through our minds anytime.
We want to know about where you spend your day! What’s on your desk right now?
It is strange to tell but I am a complete workaholic. I love to work and spend time coming up with innovative ideas. But, as all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, I like to hang out with friends and love to make short films. It’s my laptop that I keep working on for the whole day and right now too this is what is on my desk!
Favorite book?Author?
Chanakya’s Chant is my all time favorites and I love to read Dan Brown and am very much influenced by his writing skills and detailing in his novels.
Know any other cool startups or founders we should talk to? (Got any friends in the biz? Hook a girl up, yo!)
http://mobikhoj.com/ , www.justmnit.in, www.udaipurblog.com. These all are the startups founded by some of my friends themselves!
A lot of people have big ideas. What gave you the confidence to actually put your life on hold and realize yours?
“Why to waste my life in completing someone else’s dream when I can have mine!” This put my life on hold and will always keep me confident enough to make my dreams true!
Any Advice For Other Entrepreneurs?
We think we are not that much experienced to give advice to young entrepreneurs. Still there are some common points to be remembered always like:
- Don’t be disheartened if your idea is stolen by someone. The world can steal everything except for one thing and it is YOUR PASSION and that is the thing that will create the difference
- Whether you are providing some service or product, customer satisfaction should be your priority. Just one disappointed customer can give wrong feedback to 100 others so always try to hear every one of them. Just think one thing: If I am the customer then am I going to use this service/product or not.
Who has been your biggest cheerleader throughout this process?
My parents have been the true mentors throughout the process and continue to be a supporting hand.
3 people you recommend we follow on Twitter, and why?
- Richard Branson: Owner of Virgin group. An entrepreneur at the age 16 remains an inspiration as his life.
- Paulo Coelho: He posts very lively tweets which not only motivates me but also inspires my thoughts.
- Rhonda Byrne: I am a true fan of her book `The Secret’ and her tweets are awesome which can be implemented in life as well.
We also love to know the fact and figures…
We were lucky that even before taking the domain and webspace, we were sponsored by a local institute of Jaipur (Rajasthan), so we haven’t invested any money [of our own in PassKarado]. Being true, right now we are not focusing on revenue. We are focusing on covering as many institutes as we can so that maximum number of students can be benefited from us.
Where can our readers get ahold of you?
Anything else we should know?
When everyone was planning their future prospects, we joined the Entrepreneurship Development cell of our college. This cell made us learn everything about entrepreneurship and we started coming up with ideas and finally settled with an excellent one on what we are talking [about] today.
