Exclusive Interview: Madhu Priya, Daughter Of Veg Vendors Is Family's First Educated Woman

As the daughter of vegetable vendors in Tamil Nadu, Madhu Priya was made aware of class at a young age. When students at the posh Chennai school she went to - after supreme sacrifices from her parents - spoke lavishly of the international family holidays they took during the summer, it would pain Madhu deeply.

Financial conditions at her home could not accommodate any local vacations, let alone cruises abroad. Raising her hand to say "I helped my parents at the shop in the summer," she feared, would be looked down upon. So she stayed silent.

"I wouldn’t say I had a very tough life," Madhu says today, despite all her experiences. And attributes it wholeheartedly to her mother. "She sacrificed everything so we could get everything. My mother ensured we had a good life."

Madhu Priya is a first-generation learner and educated woman in her family with a corporate job and English-speaking skills, a story she shared on LinkedIn a couple days ago that has since gone massively viral. Read more on that here.

In an interview with SheThePeople, Madhu traces her steps from here back to childhood, when even affording an education for herself and her elder sister seemed formidable.

"Both my parents are school dropouts," she says. But for her children, her mother Devaki had her eye on a convent school - among the very best in the city. Reaching there wasn't an easy journey. Multiple turndowns later, her mother refused to budge from the school office until they cleared admission for her girls.

Why admission was so difficult could be attributed to either the school’s quota system or because she was the daughter of vegetable vendors. "Only bigshots studied there – actors, politicians, sportspersons' kids,” Madhu says.

Devaki's determination got them through and ultimately, both girls secured seats at the school.

"She believed in investing in education. She didn’t save any money for the future," Madhu says. Her father, Thiruvengadam, differed here and was conservative about big spends, owing to their financial conditions. But her mother was set steadfast in her dreams and those her daughters wanted to see.

Between beginning her day at 4 AM and closing the shutters after 11 PM in the night, Devaki earned approximately Rs 800/day. This income got from sweat was fed entirely into the rock-ribbed faith she had in her daughters.

"Any profits from the shop absolutely went towards us," Madhu says. Even donations the school asked for, her mother gave a good sum. "So that we didn’t feel embarrassed." Upon that same justification – something Madhu came to know in later years – her mother never visited school that much, marking her attendance only for parent-teacher meetings.

It was her way of protecting her daughters from any embarrassment their background would bring.

The Daughter Of Vegetable Vendors: Achieving Success Against Odds

One of the biggest sources of pride for Devaki today is to see her daughter conversing in English today. Not just her, but her granddaughter - Madhu's two-and-a-half-year-old - as well. "That proud smile she flashes makes me feel everything has paid off," Madhu says warmly.

The family's mother tongue is Tamil. English seeped into their conversations when Madhu attended convent, in fulfillment of Devaki's motivation behind sending her daughters to that top institution. "With her dropout knowledge," her mother began speaking to her in the little words, sentences she knew, Madhu says.

"Teaching me, she learnt too. She speaks good English now. Maybe not too fluent, but she understands it."

"This is a picture of the only trip we took, to Tirupathi": Madhu. (Pictured: her parents)

As well-etched language is for them now are their memories together fuzzy.

"If you ask my mother about my childhood, she will not remember," Madhu says. "They would wake up early morning. By the time I woke for school, they had left for work, and then we would come back to an empty house." This is something she envies her husband about, when her mother-in-law fondly retells his early days.

What Madhu does remember - rather vividly - is developing class consciousness as early as middle-school.

The class had gone to one student’s guest house for a picnic day. "I still remember that house," Madhu says. "Not because the day was good but because I felt so low. My house was not even as big as their security room."

"In class 10, one of my friend’s father openly told her not to talk to me because I’m a vegetable vendor’s daughter. My only other two friends – super rich – also started distancing themselves from me."

"I broke down. It hit hard. I stopped eating, fell sick," says Madhu. "My mother consoled me, said this will happen and that I would have to always go past that."

As a mother herself now, does she feel toxicity in the school culture has seen transformation in the way it should ensure equal, safe, conducive experiences for all students? "I don’t see a positive change. The divide, I feel, is only increasing. I realised the class-status difference around senior school. Kids today with social media and devices are realising it much earlier," she says.

From The First Girl With Masters To The First Corporate Working Woman

Bachelors college, where Madhu studied literature, was more or less built of the same experiences. "A grown-up version of school," she calls it. The big turn came when she began co-education higher college at DG Vaishnav and forayed into social work, and ultimately Human Resources.

"I used to sit in the shop with my mother during summer holidays and weekends. I found myself very comfortable with people," Madhu says.

"When I travelled, went to elderly homes and orphanages, perspectives changed. I realised there are people far less privileged than us. I have to force myself to endure what is happening or push myself beyond it." The first campus placement opportunity she walked into, she bagged.

College was also the time Madhu gained another entirely novel experience. "I was afraid of men until then. I hadn’t spoken to any, besides my cousins. It took two months for me to get along with boys." And like a film meet-cute, the first friend she made is now her husband.

Madhu with her husband and daughter

Their &t=661s">marriage is built on equal support. "He’s been with me in my professional life from day one," she says. "Being an HR professional himself, he understands me. Both of us are working-from-home and arrange our calls accordingly. When I work, he balances home and vice versa."

Madhu's parents are in their mid-50s now.

Devaki still manages the vegetable shop. Thiruvengadam, owing to frail health, has shifted focus to the lesser-demanding dairy farming business.

Gushing with pride, Madhu says, "I want to be like my mom." Which is why, at her corporate 9-5 job, she never takes any breaks from work. Somewhere, there’s probably still an urge to prove to the world that she is moving with the world, she mulls.

"I have to show that my parents’ sacrifice hasn’t gone in vain."