It is said that matches are made in heaven and fulfilled on Earth. And when one meets the love of their life and gets complete support from them, the other hardships of life become easier. One such inspiring love story is of the CEO of the educational company Byju’s, Byju Raveendran and his wife-turned-director of the company, Divya Gokulnath. Their love is the testimony of time that immense teamwork can leave a mark on history. They have set examples by not only founding the educational technology company in 2012, but also taking it to greater heights.
Currently, Byjus - The Learning App is already counted amongst one of the most successfully running educational platforms in Asia. In addition, according to Byju Raveendran and Divya Gokulnath, they are teachers from heart and later, important chairholders of their company. However, here is the love story of the two lovebirds whose union not only made them stronger, but recognisable among top entrepreneurs in the world.
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Byju Raveendran was born in 1980 in a tiny village of Azhikode, in Kerala. His father, Raveendran was a physics teacher and his mother, Shobhanavalli used to teach mathematics. Byju did his schooling from a Malayalam medium school. Apart from excelling in his studies, he was also interested in sports during his school and college days. So much so, that Byju mentioned in his several interviews that his extreme participation in more than five sports during his school days, later helped him to do the immense hard work to establish his dream business.
After graduating from Calicut University, Byju worked as a service engineer for a UK-based shipping firm, Pan Ocean. It was during one of his work breaks in 2003, he sat for the CAT exam (the Common Aptitude Test, for the entrance into the IIMs) and scored 100 percentile. To clear his doubt, he once again gave the exam and repeated the score. However, without joining the IIM, he got encouraged to teach and prepare his friends for the exam.
This was the first inspiration for his teaching career, which went up from 100 students to 1000 plus packed in auditoriums and later in stadiums as well. The overwhelming response validated his teaching method, and eventually, he quit his engineering job and took up this career. In 2007, he came up with the brand name - Byju’s Classes. Two years post this, in 2009, he launched video-based learning for CAT through VSAT.
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Talking about Byju Raveendran's wife, Divya Gokulnath, she is an Indian entrepreneur as well as an educator. In addition, she has been active in advocating for mitigating the gender pay gap in India and loves writing blogs based on her new learnings. Divya was born in 1987 in Bengaluru. Her father is a nephrologist with Apollo Hospitals, whereas her mother was a programming executive at Doordarshan. Divya did her schooling at Frank Anthony Public School. Afterwards, she did Btech in Biotechnology from RV College of Engineering in Bengaluru.
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After her graduation, Divya thought of appearing for the GRE Exam to apply for master's studies in educational institutions abroad. This was when Byju met the love of his life, Divya for the first time in his life. It was also during the initial period of his career, when he was giving coaching for a few competitive exams. On the other hand, Divya wanted to hone her Maths skills before appearing for her GRE and got to know about him from a friend. Thus, she thought of taking coaching classes for the GRE exam prep course from Byju.
As soon as Divya started getting the coaching classes from Byju, she was instantly mesmerised by his approach to teaching. Divya was indeed a hard-working student, and her immense interest in knowing new things in life connected her to the man of her dreams, Byju. Recently, when Byju and Divya appeared at India Today Conclave 2023, he revealed how her habit of asking a lot of questions made him notice her. He also revealed that Divya used to stay back after class. Gradually, this is how they fell for each other, and the rest is history. He said:
"How did the romance happen? I can tell you that I always used to teach in auditoriums like these or stadiums which are bigger than this, so it's very difficult to notice any particular student. She (Divya) used to stay back and ask a lot of questions so she got noticed and I don’t know when it changed and we became life partners."
Afterwards, Divya gave the exam with her full preparation and guidance from Byju. While she was awaiting her results, she got the first opportunity in 2008, to take her first class for students at Byju's at the age of 21. It was her teacher-turned-husband, Byju who used to constantly encourage her to become a teacher due to her questions during breaks between classes. She took many Maths, English, and Reasoning classes and instantly realised her passion for teaching. And when her results came out, she decided to follow her passion and continue teaching even after cracking admission to a few universities in the US.
During the same chat at India Today Conclave 2023, Divya mentioned that the idea of 'opposites attracts' did not apply to them. Elaborating how she and Byju are completely different personalities, she added that their values are the same. She explained:
"We don’t know what came first. That has worked out very well. You know there is this whole notion that opposites attract. I say that’s a reel-life phenomenon, not a real-life situation. Here it really helps to have like-minded people on your side, life-work, otherwise. Those who know us say we are like chalk and cheese, very different personalities, but inside, our values are exactly the same. So, all our addictions outside work are our kids, family and travel."
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After dating for a while, the lovebirds, Byju Raveendran and Divya Gokulnath tied the knot with each other in 2009. Together, they were blessed with two sons, Nish Byju in 2013 and Nivin Byju in 2020. Divya being an avid social media user, keeps updating her fans with cutesy glimpses from her life on her Instagram handle.
Talking about their professional commitments, they founded the edutech platform in 2011, and by July 2022, the app was downloaded more than 150 million times. In addition, with an overwhelming 70 million registered students learning with the app, their once a small business idea has already won several accolades, including Fortune Magazine's '40 Under 40' list of 2020, Forbes India Leadership Award (FILA) Entrepreneur for the Year 2021 and several others. They have also ranked 46th on an India Rich List and have a combined net worth of $3.05 billion (approximately Rs 22.3 thousand crores) in 2020.
Well, we are indeed inspired by Byju Raveendran and Divya Gokulnath's love story, which helped them build an empire of dreams together and carve each other's career paths. What about you? Let us know!
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