AKASH JADHAV: A JOURNEY FROM POVERTY TO FAME

Joseph Lewis said, "Superstition is the poison of the mind", and Akash Jadhav made sure that he removes these superstitions and saves those who whose poison become the reason for their own death.

Born and brought up in Nagardev, Ahmednagar, Akash was a part of an economically weak family. Their financial stature was in predicament and thus, failing to afford education, Akash had to drop out of school as early as 7th grade. However, it was something other than education or money that bothered him, it was how humans harmed snakes due to their mis-judgement, superstition and lack of knowledge about first aid after snakebite.

In 2007, he got to know about his relative, Sunil Bambal in Satara district. Sunil was involved in rescuing snakes from the area around and the underlying urge of Akash to rescue snakes made him move to Satara. Though his family was completely against this and did not permit Akash for this, he did not bother to persuade them rather moved without this consent. It was within a time span of 1 year that Akash was well versed in rescuing snakes and rather called himself perfect in this art. Along with this he also gained knowledge about the different varieties of snakes in India and the repercussions of their bite. In 2008, he moved back to Ahmednagar and started his job of rescuing snakes. Within no time he became highly popular amongst the locals and was called about 5-10 times a day for rescuing different kinds of snakes.

However, while rescuing snakes Akash understood the major cause for people killing snakes even if the snake was not the initial attacker. The superstitions which were passed down from generations about how a snake bites someone to take revenge or a snake captures the picture of a man in his eye and once bitten by a snake a man cannot be healed and so on were a key contributor to such ruthless killing. Also, the lack of knowledge about first aid after a snake bite was minimal amongst the people and thus, when they failed to save a person bitten by snake, the superstitions gained impetus. Under such circumstances, Akash took up the task to educate people about the first aid that they can give to a man if bitten by a snake and informed them how the superstitions can be harmful for all. Following this, he started getting more rescue calls as people refrained from killing snakes and thought of rescue as a better option.

Following this, Atul Pakhare, Nawaz Shaikh, Rishikesh Jadhav, Shiraj Sayyed, Siddhant Waghchaure, Rishikesh Paredeshi and Aniket Pakhare joined him and started working as a team. With the increasing workload the team proved to be highly effective and efficient. Also, as 21st Century people believe in total equality amongst men and women, it was just soon enough that Megha Bhalerav, Neeta Gajare, Rajeshri Alhat and Sheetal Kashar joined this team of snake rescuers.

Following this, Akash started a campaign to make people aware about the technique of first aid for a snake bite as he wished to amplify the information amongst the maximum number of people in the entire country. He even started a door to door campaign by collaborating with different schools.

However, his reach was restricted to Ahmednagar and so he started his own YouTube channel named, "Sarpmitra Akash Jadhav" in 2017. Currently, he has an online family of 4.46 million on YouTube, with per month viewership of 21.28 million and daily viewership of about 709 thousand. With a net worth of the channel of about $5.11 million, Akash Jadhav has not only attained a high financial status but has also served his desire to protect the snakes and spread awareness about them for the benefit of all humans and animals.

Therefore, with a 24*7 open rescue center for animals, Akash Jadhav and his team has rescued more than 12000 species of wild animals and Akash feels blessed to have done this work and wishes to continue with the same zeal.

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