This is the inspiring and encouraging story of how one woman can take the reins for her peers to develop a viable and flourishing enterprise with a focus on women’s upliftment. Parvathy Harikumar, CEO and co-founder of UC Monks, a graduate from the University of Kerala, saw the future in Flutter right from the very first release of Flutter by Google back in 2018.
She self-taught the technology and later trained numerous students and alumni from her college by conducting various workshops during the COVID-19 lockdown period and finally in December 2020 they got their company registered as UC Monks. The name UC Monks signifies dedicated and aspiring developers from the University College of Engineering, Karyavattom. Together they built Sarathi, an Android and iOS application to practice for the RTO exam in the new exam pattern.
Sarathi is an app intended to clear the Government of India Sarathi RTO Learners Exam in the first attempt! It is the only app out there that provides an exact mock as the real-world RTO Exam conducted by the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways, Government of India.
She said UC Monks will be launching more innovative applications in the days to come and that more women should come forward as entrepreneurs as there is limitless potential within them and endless opportunities out there in the world of today.
Sarathi was launched by a bureaucrat, physician, writer, singer, actress, MGNREGS State Mission Director, District Collector of Pathanamthitta, Dr. Divya S. Iyer IAS at her office. She congratulated the founder and told that more women and students should emerge as entrepreneurs.
Arshad Safuvan and Vivek S. Nair are the other co-founders. The three of them were trying to start a company since their college days and approached Kerala Start-up Mission and other avenues several times with various ideas. Despite being rejected several times they were not ready to give up. After four years of hard work they finally built a team with 30+ members, all from their own college, and launched their first impactful application.
The story does not end here, going forward Parvathy aims to involve more women in her company in pivotal roles and hopes to be an inspiration to other women to chase their dreams and find success.