India's 10 Unsung Personalities

There are people who contribute to the society greatly but are seldom known. They quietly do their bit without expecting anything in return. These extraordinary and selfless people bring meaning to hundreds of lives. Here are the unsung heroes of the nation, as listed by Tenzin Yangdon for Yahoo news.

Irom Sharmila:
Irom Sharmila is also known as the "Iron Lady of Manipur". She is a civil rights activist and a political activist. Sharmila is an example of a woman's perseverance. Since 2 November 2000, she has been on a hunger strike to demand that the Indian government abolish the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which is a cause for violence in Manipur and other parts of northeast. Not having eaten food or water for more than 500 weeks, she has been called "the world's longest hunger striker". She is on a continuous hunger strike for past 12 years. She has certainly shown the world the choice to live without fear in one's own homeland.

Ashok Khemka:
Ashok Khemka is another unsung hero on the list. He is widely known as 'Haryana's most shoved about civil servant' and was the one who blew the whistle on Vadra’s DLF deal. He is an example of an honest, dedicated IAS officer. He chose the life of an IAS officer instead of a comfortable life that usually accompanies an IIT graduate. In his 21 years in service, Khemka was transferred an enormous 43 times.

In 2008, Robert Vadra had purchased a 3.5 acre plot for Rs 7.5 crore, which he then sold to realty major DLF for Rs 58 crore. On October 8, Khemka questioned this relationship between Vadra and DLF and sought a list of Vadra's land deals. But, instead of the list he got a transfer order.

Akhil Gogoi:
Akhil is a peasant leader and an RTI activist from Assam.  Akhil came to national attention after he was awarded the Shanmugam Manjunath Integrity Award in 2008 for his persistent fight against corruption and attempts to bring transparency in the government. He was awarded the national Right to Information (RTI) Award by Public Cause Research Foundation in 2010 for his role in exposing the 1.25 crore scam in Sampoorna Gram Rozgar Yojna (SGRY) and Rs 60 lakh scam in the Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) in Golaghat district of Assam by using the RTI Act. Akhil donated the entire sum of 2lakhs of the Award to his organization KMSS.

Babar Ali:
Babar Ali is a student and teacher from Murshidabad in West Bengal. He was called the “youngest headmaster in the world” by BBC in 2009, at the age of sixteen. Babar, a student himself, enrolled at the government-run Raj Govinda School in Berhampore. In the afternoons he would teach students in a school he founded in his parents’ back yard in Murshidabad. He began teaching at the age of nine, mostly as a game, and then decided to continue teaching other children. The school continues to be run as an outdoor school and has ten teachers including Babar Ali himself. All of them are students at schools or colleges and volunteer to teach at the school. There are 800 children learning at the school and education there is completely free for the poor. In 2009, Babar won a prize for his work from the programme Real Heroes Award of the Indian English news channel CNN-IBN.

Jyotsna Sitling:
Jyotsna Sitling is the first female tribal Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer. Jyotsna is a green warrior who has spent her life restoring the eco system, from cleaning up the hills to creating jobs for the locals. With more than 25 years in the IFS, she has cleaned, planted and restored the environment. She is well-known for restoring The Valley of Flowers National Park. The hills of the Nanda Devi Biosphere had turned into a heap of plastic littered by pilgrims and Jyotsana took it upon herself to clean the entire region involving the locals. The area was later declared as a World Heritage Site in 2005 by UNESCO.

Kulandei Francis:
Another unsung hero on the list is Kulandei Francis. He is an activist, social worker and the founder of the NGO Integrated Village Development Project in Tamil Nadu. Francis has been working diligently to improve the living conditions in rural India. His organization began small with a night school and a first-aid centre in Krishnagiri. Over the years, IVDP has established over 8,200 self-help groups and has empowered over 100,000 women, giving families a stable livelihood. He was also one of six recipients of the Magsaysay Award this year for "his profound faith in community energies, and his sustained programs in pursuing the holistic economic empowerment of thousands of women and their families in rural India"

P Kalayanasundaram:
P Kalayanasundaram is from Tamil Nadu and is a gold medalist librarian, who not only dedicated his life to the poor but also donated his salary, every single month for the 35 years that he was working. The 60-year-old had no worries to earn a living doing tedious jobs. He is the Founder of 'Paalam' an NGO that he set up. The organization acts as a connection between those who wish to donate and those who need the donations.

Anand Kumar:
It isn’t an easy job to clear an IIT entrance exam. But the Ramanujan School of Mathematics in Bihar changed this notion. This year 27 made it to the IITs of the 30 students trained there. The coaching centre only teaches students from the lower income families. Students have to pass a competitive test to find a place in Super 30. The selected students devote an entire year to study and students receive food and accommodation for this duration. The institute does not accept any donation from anyone and is run chiefly by the fees collected from students who can afford to pay.
Anand Kumar, a mathematician started the coaching centre as he knew how hard it was to get good education if you are poor. Kumar gained admission at the Cambridge University but had to give up the dream of studying due to his poor financial state.

Chhavi Rajawat:
Chhavi Rajawat makes it to the list as well. This young MBA degree holder chose to work with rural India and at 32 she is the youngest woman sarpanch of her village Soda, near Jaipur. Her aim is to make her village 100 percent educated. Chhavi also works at her family home-turned-hotel called Kailrugji and has also set up a horse-riding academy in Jaipur.

P Narayanan Krishnan:
Madurai-based Narayanan Krishnan started the Akshaya Trust, an NGO in 2002. The trust has been a blessing for many homeless, ailing and hungry people.  In the first year of commencement, Krishnan used his own savings to feed around 30 people. Ever since, he's cooked and served meals to around two million people. Presently, a shelter home is being built to home those in need of shelter. Realizing that there were many Indians living overseas who wanted to contribute to the cause, Krishnan founded Akshaya USA in 2012. The foundation supports the homeless, mentally ill, elderly and the disabled.