Inspiring Biography of Safin Hasan

Safin Hasan is a famous Indian Police Service (IPS) officer.

He became famous for clearing the Civil Services Exam in his very first attempt at a young age of 22 despite facing countless challenges.

And this makes Safin Hasan’s life story very inspiring.

So read on.

Introduction-

Safin Hasan was born on 21 July 1995 into a very poor family in Kanodar, Gujarat.

His father, Mustufa Ali Hasan initially worked as a labourer in a diamond factory and later he started working as an electrician and in winters, he used to sell food items on a food cart.

As a child, Safin Hasan used to help his father with the food cart.

His mother, Nasimben Hasan initially worked in the diamond factory but she quit her job in 2000, thanks to the recession and she started making rotis for various events in the village.

The poor financial condition of his family inspired Safin Hasan to study well.

He has a younger brother.

Schooling-

Safin Hasan did his initial schooling in a Gujarati medium government school in Kanodar.

Later, he studied at S K M High School, Kanodar and scored 92% in his tenth standard.

Higher Secondary education-

Safin Hasan wanted to study science in his intermediate from a private school but he wasn’t in a position to afford the fees.

Luckily, the teachers of Ascent School of Science, Palanpur knew his talent and they waived his fees for his Higher Secondary education.

As Safin Hasan had to travel from Kanodar to Palanpur to study, his mother started working as a cook in an Anganwadi to cover his bus travel expenses.

Dreaming to become an IAS-

While studying in the primary school, a district collector visited his school.

Safin Hasan was amazed by his status and the way people were admiring that IAS officer.

And at that moment, he decided to grow up to become an IAS officer.

So, Safin Hasan started studying well and later, he secured the first rank in his ninth class.

He declared in his school that he will grow up to become an IAS officer.

Apart from being a studious student, Safin Hasan used to also actively participate in extracurricular activities.

Studying engineering-

After completing his intermediate, Safin Hasan cleared the All India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) with 99.37%.

In 2012, he joined the Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology (SVNIT) in Surat, Gujarat to study Electronics and Communications Engineering (ECE).

Here, his friends made fun of his English speaking skills and thanks to this, Safin Hasan improved his English communication skills.

In his final year of engineering, he worked as a Training and Placement Coordinator for his engineering department.

Trying to be self-reliant-

Safin Hasan has tried to be self-reliant since his first year of engineering.

In his vacations, he used to teach the children in his village and with this income he used to manage his hostel expenses.

But this income wasn’t sufficient to pay his college fees of ₹45,000 and also his hostel fees but luckily Safin Hasan was financially helped by other people.

He used to live in the Gajjar Bhavan Hostel and later in Tagore Bhavan Hostel.

Social service-

While studying engineering, Safin Hasan was very active in community service.

During that time, he was associated with three non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

In December 2013, Safin Hasan along with his friends co-founded the Project NIRMAAN in Palanpur which is involved in helping the education of children and organising cultural events.

He was also a charter president of Leo Club, Kanodar from 2014-2016.

And since then, Safin Hasan has been delivering many motivational speeches to inspire the youth.

Thanks toppers-

While studying engineering, Safin Hasan watched all the interviews of the Civil Services Exam toppers like Ira Singhal, Tina Dabi, etc. and learnt valuable tips from them.

He also read blogs to learn about cracking the Civil Services Exam.

Safin Hasan completed his engineering in May 2016 and got a placement for a job but he decided to go to Delhi to prepare for the Civil Services Exam.

His parents also supported his decision.

Getting sponsored–

Safin Hasan wanted to take coaching for the Civil Services Exam from Vajiram & Ravi in New Delhi.

But he became disappointed when he learnt that the fees for coaching is around ₹1.5 lakh and this would add up to ₹3 lakh with his living expenses in New Delhi.

During that time, the total savings in Safin Hasan’s home wasn’t even ₹10,000.

Luckily, during that time, Husainbhai Polara and his wife, Jarinaben Polara came forward to completely sponsor his Civil Services coaching.

This couple hails from his village and they knew Safin Hasan and believed in him because of his social service and NGO.

An interesting fact-

Navjot Simi and Pradeep Singh also took coaching from Vajiram & Ravi in Delhi.

Coaching for the Civil Services-

After reaching New Delhi in June 2016, Safin Hasan joined the Vajiram & Ravi coaching institute to receive coaching for the Civil Services.

As he did his schooling in Gujarati, English wasn’t his strongpoint and so to improve his English, he started reading the English NCERT books of 5^th and 6^th standards and he also used a Gujarati to English Dictionary.

Then, Safin Hasan focused more on the Main examination and the interview rather than on Prelims.

Ansar helped him to prepare for the interview.

Current affairs and question papers-

Safin Hasan read the Vision IAS’s PT 365 Supplementary Current Affairs Material.

Instead of preparing notes for current affairs, he used to read and repeatedly revise the monthly magazines.

Safin Hasan practised many previous years questions papers before the Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination.

Accident just before the Mains-

Safin Hasan was riding a scooter to attend the General Studies (Paper-III) in the Civil Services (Main) Examination.

The exam was at 9 AM and unfortunately, just half an hour before the exam, he fell down as his scooter slipped.

This accident was severe as his ligament and left hand got injured and Safin Hasan was also bleeding from his head.

After getting up, he noticed that his right hand was uninjured and so, he took a painkiller and proceeded to attend the exam.

Safin Hasan didn’t take a chance because he badly wanted to clear the Civil Services exam in his first attempt.

After attending the exam, he took a bed rest for a month and a half.

Getting hospitalised before the interview-

Safin Hasan had to attend the interview for the Civil Services exam on 23 March 2018.

But on 20 February 2018, he had a bad attack of urinary tract infection (UTI) and he also suffered a high fever.

So, Safin Hasan got admitted into a hospital to receive IV therapy.

Likewise, he was hospitalised for the whole month of February.

Safin Hasan recovered from this condition on 1 March and then travelled to Delhi to prepare for the interview.

Bad luck strikes again-

Unfortunately, on 3 March 2018, Safin Hasan suffered a bad attack of tonsillitis and as a result, his WBCs count increased to 30,000 per microliter.

So, he had no option except to return to Palanpur to get hospitalised.

On 15 March, Safin Hasan got discharged from the hospital and the next day, he reached Delhi to prepare for the interview.

And on 23 March 2018, he attended the UPSC interview and secured the second highest marks of 204 in the interview.

Cracking the Civil Services Exam-

Safin Hasan cracked the UPSC CSE 2017 and secured a rank of 570 and at that time, he was just 22.

Thanks to this rank, he got into the Indian Police Service (IPS) and became the youngest IPS officer in India.

Later, Safin Hasan also cleared the Gujarat Public Service Commission (GPSC) exam in the first attempt and secured a GPSC Class 1 rank of 34.

He didn’t separately prepare for the GPSC exam but his preparation for the UPSC exam helped him.

Safin Hasan is an IPS officer of the 2018 batch and belongs to the Gujarat Cadre.

An interesting fact- Sachin Atulkar also became an IPS officer at the age of 22 in the UPSC CSE 2006.

Choosing Gujarati-

Even though Safin Hasan prepared for the Civil Services Exam in English, he wrote the Civil Services (Main) Examination in Gujarati.

He preferred Gujarati because he did his schooling in it and was able to express well in it rather than in English.

Safin Hasan chose Gujarati literature as his optional subject.

So, how are you inspired by the success story of Safin Hasan?

Share with me in the comment section below.