Indian billionaire recalls railway platform that shaped his journey, shares nostalgic tale

Indian billionaire Arokiaswamy Velumani reflects on his student struggles, sharing how hours spent on a railway platform helped shape his discipline and career.

Indian scientist and billionaire entrepreneur Arokiaswamy Velumani, founder of Thyrocare Technologies, has shared a deeply personal and nostalgic account of his student life, reflecting on how poverty, patience and discipline played a defining role in shaping his career.

In a detailed post, Velumani looked back at his college years between 1974 and 1978, when he studied at Sri Ramakrishna Mission Vidyalaya near Coimbatore. He described how financial constraints forced him to make difficult but formative choices, calling himself “fortunate” for having grown up poor.

Velumani explained that city colleges were beyond his family’s means, with higher tuition fees and hostel costs. Studying at SRMV, located about 25 kilometres from the city, was significantly cheaper, but even the hostel fees there were unaffordable for him. He eventually found accommodation at a government-run Harijan hostel in the city, which was free of cost.

Daily travel, however, posed another challenge. While bus fares were too expensive for his limited budget, a student quarterly pass for a passenger train cost just Rs 7. That decision led him to spend nearly 12 hours a day commuting, arriving at the railway platform before dawn and returning only late in the evening.

1974 to 1978 I studied in Sri Ramakrishna Misson Vidyalaya, Coimbatore. Reason to go there : City colleges fees: Rs 1000 to 3000. Hotel fees : 200 per month. In SRMV: (25 kms from city) College fees: 300 Hotel fees : 75 per month. Reason to travel by train: I could not… pic.twitter.com/MPmvbS6Ag9

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— Dr. A. Velumani.PhD. (@velumania) January 30, 2026

With long gaps between train schedules and college hours, Velumani found himself spending nearly six hours a day on the railway platform. Instead of seeing it as wasted time, he turned the platform into his classroom, using those hours to intensely study mathematics, physics, and chemistry.

Reflecting on his journey to securing a job at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Velumani credited those “1,000 days and 6,000 hours” of focused study on fundamental scientific concepts. At the time, his mother was the sole earning member of the family, making just Rs 3 a day. He recalled how she even sold her four bangles to pay his college fees.

“These sacrifices shaped everything that followed,” Velumani wrote, adding that he later took his wife to the same railway platform to show her how that modest space had helped turn him into a scientist.

Summing up his journey, Velumani said poverty taught him patience, focus, frugality and discipline, values that may lead to slow progress but ensure lasting success. “Fortunately, I was poor,” he wrote, describing it as the foundation of both his career and life philosophy.