My name is Karmapal Singh. I belong to a local village, Kalanaur in Gurdaspur district of Punjab.
Since childhood I aspired to join the Indian Army. I grew up watching my father serving in Sikh regiment and it was his dream that I would go one step beyond him to become an officer one day. He once told me, “As a serviceman in the Army, I’ve always saluted my superiors. I am waiting for the day when I will get to salute you.”
I tried for NDA twice but things didn't go well for me. I took admission into Baring Union of Christian College, Batala, where I pursued BSE. Things started to become worse when my father met with an accident. The Brain Injury made his case even more earth shattering. It felt as if everything started to crumble into pieces and I became more and more worried about my future and my father’s dream. That’s when I thought of taking baby steps towards my goal. Later, I joined Army as soldier General Duty (G.D) in infantry in the Sikh regiment but even when serving as an OR I always kept my vision clear about fulfilling my father’s dream. Finally, when I got the opportunity, I grabbed it without a second thought and did my best to clear my ACC written exam. I came in top 500 in the list and got selected for training at Young Leaders Training Wing, started by General Bipin Rawat. The top 500 candidates selected were sent to OTA CHENNAI for leadership classes. I acquired the knowledge, worked on my communication skills but still there was a need of clarity of thoughts as I didn’t know how to present myself in front of others.
As a result, my Commanding Officer advised me to join the Georgians defence academy, Delhi. Here, they completely changed me into a whole new person. They taught me how to prepare myself to help the accessors know about me. Deepak Sir is the one who helped me in preparing for SSB. There was a concept that stuck to my mind,” THINK, RELATE AND PRESENT”. So, they helped me build up my confidence and improved my interpersonal skills. Later, I appeared for my SSB and applied whatever I had learnt. By presenting myself with utmost sincerity and transparency, I cleared it.
