A Middle Class Youth Emerges Rs as 473 crore Rapido owner !

Ladies and gentlemen, esteemed colleagues, and fellow change-makers, in a world often driven by valuations, transactions, and short-term gains, there lies a profound transformative force that transcends conventional measures of success – Purpose. Today, I want to explore how purpose is not just a philosophical concept, but a powerful engine that drives meaningful impact, steering our collective journey from the front seat.

I come from a typical middle class family, nothing really noteworthy or special. Just another kid trying to thrive. When I was 12, I noticed I am not like everyone else. At Least I didn't speak like everyone else around me. Communication was hard for me, words wouldn’t flow out fluently for which I was often bullied. It's no surprise that the world or even school belongs to well-spoken extroverts or it seems so. My friends often pointed it out and soon I realized I had an actual speech condition. I am a stammerer. This took a toll on my self-confidence and soon became a label, one that I so didn't want then. I was so ashamed of how I spoke, when I first heard a recorded voice of myself. I felt pathetic, absolutely helpless, and lost. Things got no better as teasing and bullying soon became common among my peers. The self-pity and despair soon turned to aggression and I once smashed a bully's head into the wall and he started bleeding heavily. Not something I am proud of. The aggression soon turned into silence. 

As soon as I entered UG, Cultural shock hit me hard. For someone who's already labeled a shy, loner, villager.competing with everyone who seemed to have better skills, better communication ability, better exposure, and what seemed like better everything. It was clear that I am underprivileged. It should be no surprise that throughout college, the library became my best friend, the one place where everyone is expected to stay strictly silent! Years went by. 

Soon out of college, I met my co-founders and donned the hat of a newbie entrepreneur, which means I need to speak..notjust for myself but speak up for my whole team and am representing my whole company all the time. It was extremely challenging with a head full of thoughts and an intent to express but not exactly being able to do so. I was responsible for my team and my inability made me question and blame myself for the lost opportunities and made me depressed. I needed to change things and soon visited a therapist hoping for an aha moment. The only learning was whatever change I am expecting needed to come from within rather than from outside.

The thing is, I heard the idiom so many times, fake it, till you make it. But I think that hardly works in real life and in so many situations. When we fake it, we do know we are pretending to make us feel like impostors. whereas I think we need to acknowledge, accept and rather embrace things to actually make it. Thus my journey of purpose begins with a fundamental transformation. I moved from being a passive Passenger to an active Driver of change. 

Same day night, at a restaurant I picked up a mike and sang my way through karaoke in front of actual people! I pushed myself to be in challenging spots. For example, Although we had a customer support team (the ones who actually have a verbal seed of a zillion words per minute) I would insist on taking a few calls every day myself posing as customer support to speak to people and resolve issues timely. I once took up a challenge to speak to a stranger every day for the next 30 days and forced myself to travel by bus so that I could meet and speak to as many people as possible. 

Imagine shifting from simply responding to the world to actively shaping it. I always wanted to get rid of this stammering, nothing worked until decades later, until I aligned my actions with a deeper meaning. I mean, Until you make it, Just Brave it. Don't Fake it. I repeat. “Brave it, until you make it”

● The Purpose as Compass

In 2014, Along with roommates my journey started with Karrier, a trucking company, where we wanted to help truck drivers earn better livelihood by discovering more opportunities. The impact that we intended to create in the lives of these truck drivers brought all 3 co-founders, Pavan, Aravind and myself together. Soon we managed to raise a seed round of 1 crore to build the business. We got to hire a great team after multiple trials and errors, and things were going well, we were scaling the business to multiple cities. But somewhere we couldn't feel satisfied by the end of the day, we couldn't see the impact that we wanted to create. As a B2B business our impact and growth were always subjected to growth of another business. We didn't like that fact and wanted to change it. After a lot of deliberation we decided to shut down the business and do something else.  Didn't know what!

We confessed it to our team, and mentioned we will do something else but this time something that will create more impact, something where there are not subjected to external companies, a consumer business, thus Rapido, India’s first Bike Taxi was born. Neither Bike nor Taxi was new to India. Just that no one combined together and challenged the status quo until then. It was started with a dream to move people not just across the city, but move people of a population scale. A dream of a place, where a small girl in a village should be able to travel without a companion in the night. 

We started it in Nov 2015, at the time when there wasn't any framework on how to operate Bike Taxi, though Provision existed from 1980. At the time neither customer knew about the concept of Bike taxis nor the Driver knew he could earn only driving people from point A to B. At the time when the competition had billions of dollars in the bank. 

We started off with small money in the bank, in a few areas of the city to find the Product market fit. We couldn't outpace the competition with money or resources or a brand. Nothing. Every other person we reached out to seek some investment have either invested already in other mobility companies or would fear the uncertainties of business. We reached out to everyone who can potentially invest. In fact more than 75 of them. Actually went and knocked on the door of one of the investor’s house in desperation to raise money. What we knew was “When going gets tough, the tough gets going” that toughness comes from the purpose, our purpose was the impact that we wanted to create in the world. Eventually people who saw the same future as us came forward, including Hero’s Pawan Munjal, AdvantEdge, Nexus and others. 

● Navigating Challenges: Purpose as Resilience

As we scaled the business, competition intensified. We edged on to only one thing: efficiency, whatever it took for other people we strived to get the same with less.  While we could do more business easily we stuck on to solve one thing right. Bike Taxi, for the first 6 years of inception we only did one thing and wanted to get that right. 

But then at Covid hit, the only thing that you can't do is, go out. That's exactly what we had built the business on. Movement. Everything came to stand still, our growth curve took a pause. Rides went to 0. Customers started uninstalling the app. 100s of employees had left with no work to do in the company. More than that, our Captains, (our Drivers) who migrated to the city went back to their villages. 

This wasn't the first time we had a crisis to overcome. We tried seeing the same world differently, like a fisherman who can't fish will mend the nets. We took this as an opportunity rather than an adversity. We learnt from history, every time the economy collapsed, a new generation of companies were born. We wanted it to be ours this time, Rapido 2.0 when every other company we see was cutting down the number of people in the company by firing them. We encouraged the team to reinvented themselves and solve a new problem, a customer support person became a product manager, an operations person became an analyst, and so on. Our Captains suffered the most as their livelihood depended on us. We gave out loans to few of the loyal drivers in need of money. The purpose kept us going, we started doing essential delivery including working with different governments of state. Left no stone unturned to create more impact this time including making the platform more inclusive with Auto Rickshaws and eventually Cabs. 

Purpose is not just a fair-weather companion. It becomes most powerful during challenging times, serving as a source of resilience and strength. When obstacles arise, a clear sense of purpose provides the emotional and psychological fuel to persevere. Many remarkable stories of human achievement are not about those who never faced challenges, but about those who maintained their commitment to a larger goal despite seemingly insurmountable difficulties.

● The Effect of Impact

Rapido started as Bike taxi service is now a full blown mobility platform operating in 125 cities. With 40 lakh plus, Rapido drivers have earned more than 10000 crores till date. And clocking more than 8 crore rides every month, we are moving cities being the largest Ride sharing company in the county surpassing the competition.the ride. 

Today reality is most of the people around us are trapped in debt for some need. made will force them to live in debt for most part of their life. After all we are humans, emotions matter. We believe we can change the lifestyle of these young aspirational people to dream big, change their lifestyle, and go solve the next big thing after attaining better financial status with Rapido. I take immense pride in the Impact we get to create by lakhs of drivers earning their livelihood and deconjusting the city’s traffic and reducing the pollution with ride sharing.

Purpose is my Belief, it structures my action ie Behaviour, And Impact is my Business. These are the 3Bs of my Life. 

The true magic of purposeful action lies in its multiplier effect. When we act with genuine intention, we do more than accomplish individual goals – we create a ripple effect that extends far beyond our immediate sphere of influence. Each purposeful action has the potential to inspire others, create meaningful connections, and catalyze collective movement. We've seen remarkable examples where purpose-driven initiatives have created systemic change, transforming communities, industries, and even global paradigms.

Harnessing your purpose requires intentional effort. It demands deep self-reflection to understand your core values and motivations. It involves aligning personal and professional goals with a broader impact, continuously learning, and adapting. Building collaborative networks that amplify your purpose becomes crucial. Moreover, we must learn to measure impact beyond traditional metrics, recognizing that true value often cannot be captured in spreadsheets or quarterly reports.

As we stand at the crossroads of unprecedented global challenges and opportunities, purpose is no longer a luxury – it's a necessity. By choosing to drive from the front seat, we're not just creating change; we're becoming the change. Your purpose is your most powerful vehicle. It doesn't just transport you; it transforms you and the world around you.

I challenge each of you: Identify your purpose, align your actions, and drive impact with intention. The front seat is waiting for you!