“I hail from a small hamlet in Erode and was raised in a joint family. My aunt was into painting and artwork, and I used to spend my childhood helping her organize her art material, do the tiny chores she used to give me and work on imitation drawings. That apart, I had no formal training in painting or drawing or any art form for that matter. Hailing from a small village, I had to take the town bus to reach my school every day, more so, if I stayed back for sports practice after school. I was someone whom you could call as the over-enthusiastic kid that was part of every competition, and I used to sign up for a lot of activities, but also made sure that my grades don’t go down because of this. Actually keeping my grades steady, was my way of telling everyone not to interfere with my life choices. Growing up in a large family with all my cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and my parents around meant that I was showered with all the love in the world, making my childhood the best that one could ever ask for. I remember spending my childhood with my cousins taking a swim in the well, stealing mangoes from the grooves nearby, running around and playing in openfields, taking a government bus to school, and much more, all of which seemed to be normal tome until I discussed these with my friends later in college. Being raised in a city background, they found these stories to be amusing and fascinating, that is why I decided to use these stories and incidents to narrate in my comic strip. My 351.70- meters comic strip for the Guinness record captures random instances and memories from my childhood in the form of Gundo Malli’s life. The motivation for the comic strips came from a couple of my friends notice that I am good at drawing comics and asked me to do something about it. I was depressed as a teenager and did not have anyone to talk to, I was close to my family, but some issues that were bothering me – I was not comfortable discussing it with them and that led me to depression. Drawing came to my rescue, until then, I had never done drawings from my imagination, but this was my outlet for all the pent up emotions and I used to scribble on every piece of paper that I found. That’s when aclose friend of mine pointed out that I should take this up more seriously and keep a log of the drawings I make. That’s when I happened to meet a photographer who holds the Guinness World Records for achievement in Photography, this got me thinking and I decided to take my comic strips to the next level, I decided to break the existing Guinness World Records for thelongest comic strip. While I wanted to start working on this idea, I had the support and love of my friends, but my parents were worried and wanted me to settle down in life by getting married. We had disagreements, I couldn’t explain to them my point of view, one after the other profiles of eligible guys were shown to me, which was aggravating me all the more. I decided to show my parents that I am not ok with the way things are going, I tonsured my hair. This action did what my words could not. They decided to stop pestering me about the wedding and let me follow my dreams. I started working on the life story of Gundo Malli – the protagonist of my comic strip. After eight months of hard work, numerous sleepless nights, and self-doubts, I completed the project with the love from my friends and the constant encouragement from my family. My father was my pillar of strength through it all. Finally, I set a new record for creating the longest cartoon strip that measures up to 351.70m. It was displayed at Semmozhi Poonga in Teynampet on September 21, 2019, where I saw my hard work take shape and be rewarded. With this achievement in my portfolio, I plan on building my own startup and also teach kids to draw. I believe the journey has just begun and there’s a long way to go!”

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