Word's worth millions!
ANU GARG, 40
By Ajay Uprety
Believe it or not. Words are money. Anu Garg, 40, became a millionaire by selling English words.
Here's how. Garg grew up in a humble family in the nondescript village of Khakrauda in western Uttar Pradesh. He went to village schools and did not learn English until Class six. But that was enough to develop in him a fascination for words. Says his sister Mamta Agrawal: "His love for words started when he was quite young."
At the age of 25, Anu left for the US on a scholarship. He entered the business of selling words in 1994, when he launched a website for sending a word a day to subscribers. The response was overwhelming. His subscribers grew by leaps and bounds. Anu, an engineer by profession, became the self-described wordsmith that he is today.
Now based in Seattle in the US, Anu gets over 200 mails from word lovers. His words are popular with university students and corporate employees alike. Among his subscribers are Infosys, IBM and Wipro. His Indian subscribers number around 4,000. Anu used the internet and dictionaries for his research.
There is more to his credit. His first book, A Word A Day: A Romp Through Some of the Most Unusual and Intriguing Words in English, remained in the list of Amazon's top 100 bestsellers for two weeks.
Anu and his wife, Stuti, believe in simple living and shun animal- products like milk, leather and honey. A perfect life is the word, perhaps!
(The Week, 07:10:2007)
Labels: English usage
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home