Here's The Kind Of Inspiring Stories That We Should Look Out For In 2021: See List

While 2020 has been written down in history as the worst one for human kind, the year also brought out a different side of humans. The side that was more kind, more inspiring and that forced us to look at the brighter side. Even during such testing times, stories emerged where some were hailed as heroes, warriors and sometimes saviours.

Here's a list of the people who inspired one and all amid COVID pandemic.

1. Students in Tawang turn masons

In the town of Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh, not far from the border with China, the belief of some youngsters is that the pen is mightier than the sword and they are implementing it. As per a report in The New Indian Express, students turned masons and carpenters to build a community library.

ANI

The aim is to inspire locals to read. They made the library by dismantling an old government structure. The work was completed in 40 days and it was under the supervision of the All Tawang District Students¡¯ Union. Chief Minister Pema Khandu could not stop praising the students and shared some pics on his Twitter feed.

2. IFS officer helps villagers build dams

In the Ara and Keram villages under Ormanjhi Block, located around 45 km from Jharkhand's capital Ranchi, an IFS officer took a unique step to teach the residents the importance of being self-reliant.

Source/The Indian Express

Siddharth Tripathi, IFS, posted as Commissioner (MGNREGA) three years ago, has helped transform two of the most economically and socially backward villages in the state and has helped them become self-reliant. According to a The New Indian Express, Tripathy arrived in these villages three years ago to do some ¡°experiment¡±, for which the villagers were just not ready. He kept visiting the place and finally succeeded in persuading them. With the help of Tripathi, the villagers created check dams on the streams using loose boulder structure. Through shramdaan by 180 villagers in Ara and Keram, for 75 days non-stop, 700 lbs check dams worth Rs 1.75 crore were built.

3. Garbage collector gets accepted to Harvard

The 18 year-old Rehan Staton didn't have money to pay his college tuition and used to work as a trash collector just to pay his fee. Pulling it through somehow, he graduated from a college in Maryland.

AP

Yet, after facing an uphill battle just to get basic education, he is now headed to Harvard University, after being accepted to one of the premier universities in the world. After graduating in 2018, Staton took an analyst job at a consulting firm in Washington D.C. He eventually applied to law school, and was accepted to Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Southern California and Pepperdine University. (Georgetown University; New York University; the University of California, Berkeley; and UCLA placed him on their waitlist.)

4. From An Orphanage To ICC Hall Of Fame - Lisa Sthalekar

Lisa Sthalekar is a known face when we see her offering expert opinions during the IPL, or other big leagues and even in international tournaments. But she is much more than that.

BCCL

A former cricketer who represented Australia at the highest level, she was recently inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame. But her journey in life did not begin in the backyards of Australia. In fact it started in Pune, India. Lisa's biological parents could not support her so they left her at an orphanage. It was from there that her life changed. A couple from USA, were visiting to adopt a son, but it did not pan out. They took one look at her and soon the formalities were completed to take her back with them to the states. She was just 3 weeks old when she went to USA.

5. Malvika Iyer wrote a thesis after losing both her hands

30-year-old Malvika Iyer had the devastating misfortune of losing both her hands in a grenade explosion. She was only 13 years old at the time. Hailing from Bikaner, the bilateral amputee celebrated her 30th birthday on February 18, 2020 and tweeted her survival story.

UN

After a fire at an ammunition depot, a grenade had landed in the now-disability activist's garage. Iyer had the misfortune of holding the grenade which left her with no hands, severe injuries to her legs and paralysis of the nerves. She shared that the medical authorities were under so much pressure to perform the surgery that Iyer was left with a painful protruding bone that wasn't covered in flesh. She wrote, "Dotors made a mistake during surgery but that very mistake has proven so incredible that the bone acts like my only finger. That's how I type!"

She further shared that the protruding bone is what helped her write her PhD thesis and the website she wanted to share with the world which was only possible thanks to her "extraordinary" finger.

6. Khalsa aid workers help farmers, migrants

The UK based Sikh Charity, Khalsa Aid, known for their humanitarian work for refugees across the world joined the chorus of the global support for protesting farmers, migrants who were fleeing cities during the lockdown and many more distressed individuals who were in need of help.

Khalsa Aid

Restoring our faith in humanity, the Khalsa aid workers relentlessly served langar to the displaced during the lockdown, helped farmers and reached out to financially support many families who bore the brunt of the pandemic. Not just that, they served meals to drivers stranded at the UK border due to restrictions in the country following new variant of coronavirus.