Fifteen years back a youth hailing from an impoverished, backward caste family in Karnataka defied social convention when he went to the US on an International Exchange Programme and eventually started his very own healthcare staffing company. It would have been the perfect ending to Michael Thevar’s real life rags to riches story if he had chosen to move on, except that he has already started work on the “next agenda in his life” — to establish a ‘Bhimnagar’ or a ‘Buddhavihar’ in Pennsylvania.

Thevar who acquired his Bachelors and Masters degrees in Social Work from Nirmala Niketan and Tata Institute of Social Sciences is back in the city, busy making preparations to take a batch of 20 candidates hailing from SC, ST and OBC backgrounds back with him to the USA. These candidates are trained social workers who will be working in Thevar’s Temp Solutions as counsellors and therapists and will eventually be a part of the future ‘Bhimnagar.’

Born to an industrial labourer and a housewife in Karnataka, Thevar collected firewood to support his seven-member family, a memory which still haunts him. “I couldn’t forget my caste despite my NRI status as its a part of my identity and realised that besides professional goals, I had a social responsibility towards my community as well,” said Thevar who had then decided to recruit youth from the socially backward communities in India in his company.

“In 2005 I had recruited 13 candidates belonging to the backward castes and these 20 will be this year’s addition to the company. Six families of the previous batch have already applied for a Green Card. My aim is to recruit around 125 such candidates in the next three years, enable them to shift to the US with their families. Just like there are Dalit groups, Dalit networks, Dalit student forums, I have envisaged a Dalit, SC, ST, OBC community,” said Thevar.

However, Thevar is clear on which candidates will be chosen to work with him, clearly preferring those who have undergone impoverished childhoods and social stigma owing to their caste. “Only those candidates who really hail from socially and economically poor backgrounds are chosen. There are certain castes that are financially stable now and candidates from such families not considered. In short, I voluntarily choose candidates who bear traces of my life, those who have not let their social status and the struggle affect their determination to succeed and those who show the zeal to give back to the community,” he added.

Thevar’s company, which had a turnover of $4 million last year, funds the cost of visas and immigration attorney fees, which comes to Rs 2.5 lakh per candidate while the latter have to pay for their tickets.

One of the candidates, Praful Kamble, a converted Buddhist brought up in a Worli chawl, possesses a Masters in Medical and Psychiatric Social Work and is the only person in his entire family who will be stepping foot outside the country. Ashok Khairnar and his wife Pallavi, both of whom have been selected to join Temp Solutions, found it surreal that while their lower caste status and their inter-caste marriage prevented them from getting a flat in the city, it has earned them jobs abroad.