Meet Maya Neelakantan, the 11-year-old ‘rock goddess’ from America’s Got Talent

pproach to life. They want someone who can endorse them, who will bring their team a good name.”

Soon after he watched that first race on TV, his obliging parents took the excited eight-year-old to a go-karting track called the Allsports Grand Prix in Northern Virginia. He failed to meet the height requirements but was back the following year, determined to practice on his own. He was noticed by the track owner, Francois, who remarked to Atharva’s father that the boy “drives like a young Sir Jackie Stewart” and began teaching him the fundamentals of racing.

“I was 10 when I entered my first junior league,” says the Indian teen racing champ. A rookie, going up against opponents far more experienced than himself, he went on to win the championship, levelling up, and emerging victorious the next year too. “There was the last level left to compete at but my teacher stopped me. He thought I would beat everyone. My adult opponents wouldn’t have been happy about that,” he smiles.

After finishing second at the ROTAX National Race, Atharva was invited to test Formula 4 cars. And he impressed all. “I got blazing times. It got me noticed,” says the Indian teen racing champ who, in search of a good school to study engineering, chose Oxford Brookes College in the UK due to its motorsports curriculum.

At the Young Racing Driver Academy in Virginia, he met Jamie Horner, director, an established name, Horner’s brother, Christian, the British team principal for team Redbull Formula 1. “I became a developing driver to improve my skills, and hopefully race for them in the future,” says the 19-year-old. At the academy in Anglesey, drivers were put on simulators, chosen based on skills and timing. Atharva found out soon enough that F4 cars in the UK are quite different from those in the US. “The American cars are digital, less rigid. They’re not meant for aggressive racing. In the UK, they’re built for aggressive drivers – which is what I am,” says the Indian teen racing champ who re-honed his skills, leaving his mentors impressed.

How Nikki Lauda inspired him

Committed and driven, Atharva Desai is up before 6 am, starting with an hour at the gym. Back home, he cooks breakfast, and heads to class. Unwavering discipline, born of mental fortitude, he explains, “I don’t get angry often. Motorsports, especially, the earlier phases are competitive and full of aggression. You’re getting attacked both on and off the track. So, you learn. If someone provokes me, I think, my goal is to be in F1. My goal is not to meddle with the guy.”

Even his choice of idols is unusual – Nikki Lauda, the legendary Austrian Formula One and three-time F1 World Drivers’ Champion, the only driver in history to be champion for both Ferrari and McLaren. In 1976, Lauda’s Ferrari swerved off the track and burst into flames. “He was pulled out of the car with half his face on fire. He didn’t give up, with dedication and mental strength, he made it through. Nothing could stand in his way,” says the Indian teen racing champ.

All about motorsport

Doing engineering in motorsport technology at Oxford, Atharva is uncommonly mature. “I was raised with Indian values. I understand that a little competition can go a long way,” he adds.

This year, he hopes to join a Formula 3 team in the US. “I have built good relationships there, and they are willing to give me an F3 seat,” says the racer whose connection with Arden Motorsports will continue alongside. “Next year, I start negotiating with Formula 2 teams. I also have to work at getting sponsors to back me,” says the Indian teen racing champ.

The chequered flag beckons

Much of his success, the Indian teen racing champ attributes to his unwavering resolve. “Attitude, confidence and general likeability all count for a lot. Being a race driver requires huge mental fortitude,” says the boy whose daily regimen involves mental training, “I do reaction time testing and I juggle - for balance and skill.”

Racing is an expensive sport, and staying on the track is thanks to the unflinching support by his parents. “I'm motivated by the fact they trust me and know I'm working hard,” says Atharva. He practices on iRacing, a simulation software. “There are actual drivers and scouts on it, so I  practice and register for races,” says the teen, who loves to skateboard or decipher the Rubic's Cubes. Music is also a pet passion, “When I have time to spare, I make electronic music on my laptop,” he adds. The Indian teen racing champ’s 3,420 followers on Instagram are fondly called A4Rians, and he regularly updates them on race day highs.

As Youth Ambassador for Quench 66 by AquaKraft Pvt. Ltd, an initiative by the government of Maharashtra, he is also moving forward the mission to provide 50 million litres of drinking water across 500 schools in the state.

• Follow Atharva on Instagram or visit his website, https://www.atharva4racing.com/

ews mark - and it's not just clickbait, either. He receives plenty of advice telling him to take the IIT route and he shuns it all. "I will definitely go to college, I want the experience, but I would like it to be MIT or Stanford," Ayush tells Global Indian in an interview. The big ticket offers come in from the MLOps companies around the world, Ayush likes to pick and choose, preferring startups to bigger firms and foreign companies to Indian ones.

[caption id="attachment_18727" align="aligncenter" width="782"] Ayush Singh[/caption]

Reborn in hardship 

He’s an unusual prodigy. Until the pandemic, he lived an affluent, suburban life with his family in Patna. When Covid-19 hit and businesses collapsed, his father was among those who took a fall, leaving the family in a very tough situation, financially. "We went from having every luxury in the world to wondering where our next meal was coming from and watching relatives and friends distance themselves," Ayush says. The situation was dire - the IIT-JEE route didn’t seem like an option.

So, Ayush got to work. He began cold emailing founders and networking on LinkedIn, trying his hand first at web and android development, both spaces crowded by enthusiastic teenagers. There was no dearth of critics telling him not to enter the tech space, that he "wouldn't even get ₹10,000 per month." Luckily, he chose not to listen. Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are budding, complex spaces, requiring skills that can't be learned through a couple of crash courses or on YouTube. He did spend a lot of time on the latter "but there's so much more to learn than can be done through videos," Ayush explains. "I would read numerous books, even on a single topic, to bring myself to a professional level."

He began by learning Python, picking up a copy of Python For Geeks (Muhammad Asif), graduating to O'Reily's Robust Python and then to more advanced design patterns. He also had to learn the Math. "I did Algebra, Linear Algebra, Calculus from Khan Academy," Ayush explains. He found he had a knack for data science and machine learning - "From coding, I jumped to machine learning and deep learning." So far, he's read over 20 books on the subject.

He dedicated “24 hours a day to do this." He would wake up at 5 am and spend anywhere between 10 and 16 hours studying, apart from the five or six hours that he had to give to school. When the time came to return to campus, he would carry his books with him.

Wooing employers 

Building a profile and upping his skills was one thing but landing a job was a whole new challenge. He could impress his potential employers with his skills but predictably enough, was told that he was too young. Cold-emailing worked well and he chose startups believing they’d be open to taking a chance. That’s how he found a post by ZenML on LinkedIn. "I emailed the founder, Adam. I highlighted my skills and although I didn’t know much about MLOps at the time, I had prepared a project that aligned with the company's aim." The founder replied and Ayush was put through two sets of interviews - a coding interview and a 'take home challenge'.  He got the job and is now experienced at conducting interviews himself. What's the trick, though?

 Unleashing the entrepreneur within 

His ability to think differently, learn new skills and get companies to hire him at the age of 13 is, arguably, a great entrepreneurial talent in itself. But he has struck out on his own - aside from his full-time job, school and the freelance assignments he takes on, Ayush is also building his own startup, Antern with co-founders Tushar Vaswani and Priyanshu Bhattacharjee. He describes Antern as the ‘Netflix of Education’. "We're leveraging AI and ML for the education space," he says. Taking off from the massive success of his MIT-recommended course on Free Code Camp, the company is launching 'nano degrees', certificate courses that are in-depth versions of the free course. The company launched on June 20 and also involves an AR/VR master course.

"I started with a basic machine learning course and thought, let's do this on a large scale," Ayush says. He met his co-founder, Tushar, through the YouTube comment box. Antern harnesses an AI assistant that can assess a student’s performance every week and answer complex Codex questions.

Ayush is also building Schema, a platform that caters to content creators. More than half of content creators don't understand the analytical tools that gauge performance. Schema will retrieve data by analysing all social media platforms to provide a comprehensive report on performance and how the customers are responding. "You will also be able to segment your customers and target them specifically," he says.

[caption id="attachment_18726" align="aligncenter" width="830"] Ayush with content creator Ishan Sharma (left)[/caption]

Carving a niche 

He also prefers to work with companies abroad. "Indian companies treat you like a kid," says Ayush. "Even if they hire you, they give you repetitive tasks that they don't want to do. At ZenML, I was treated like a core member; I was even involved in the company's retreat where the founders were making decisions. They focus on your skills and give you unique tasks. Indian startups tend to focus on their growth but companies like ZenML know that their growth involves mine too."

Staying grounded 

He sees himself "building my own multi-million-dollar company" five years down the line. Entrepreneurship is the plan. His father tells him, "Your work shouldn't be just for one family. Do it for 1000 families, just like Ratan Tata." Ayush has kept his word, helping young people find good jobs.

At home, his parents are immensely proud of their talented son. They advise him to keep going, even when he fails and to remain humble. "Because I have seen rock bottom and I will never forget what that was like.”

The future of ML, AI and Deep Learning 

It's a promising area, Ayush says. "Machine Learning, Deep Learning and AI will create millions of jobs all over the world. But they won't be able to find talented developers." Companies might be willing to pay handsome salaries but expect something in return. "It's not just about learning some coding," he says. "There is a paucity of talented developers. People who say they know ML know how to use an API and build an algorithm but it's important to know what works where. And when an algorithm doesn't work, how do you tweak your data to make it happen?"

He can't stress the importance of domain knowledge enough. "The jobs are there and will pay well but will remain untaken. You can't succeed in AI and ML if you don't know Maths because that's what it is, at its core. And then, you need to code. It's not enough to just use the buzzwords and think you know the subject."

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