Coimbatore : Have you ever come across someone so talented that they make you wonder why you haven’t heard of them before?

A similar line of thought led three 21-year-olds from Coimbatore to start a Facebook page dedicated to bringing out talented gems hidden in the shadows of their own city.

Perumal Raj, Srinath Jaganathan and Mrinalini Iyer came together for a cause. “Perumal was the one who came up with the idea,” says Mrinalini , “He and Srinath were batchmates, so Srinath joined him. Srinath and I work on the same floor at the same company. We were friends. So when they needed someone to handle the content, I joined.”

The idea: to bring talented, passionate people of Coimbatore into limelight.

‘People of Coimbatore’ was begun with one aim, “We believe that coimbatore has its own share of inspirational people who follow their passion and we would like to show them to the world”, the trio say.

“We knew a lot of people who were extremely talented but did not get as much recognition as they should, said Mrinalini to The Covai Post, “Basically these are people who never stood under the limelight. In fact, they never bothered about the limelight, and instead focused on their passions.”

The trio are unanimous on one thought. The page is not about them, its focus is on the idea. Hence for that reason, they didn’t want their faces or other personal details to come out. They wanted to remain as anonymous as possible.

“Because this is not about money or personal recognition, it started from a selfless motive,” says Mrinalini . Their current goal is to increase their reach and gather enough shares and likes to start a website for their project.

Each of the trio has a different role to play. Perumal is in charge of media and photography; Srinath finds and chooses the stories; and Mrinalini is in charge of content writing and interviewing.

Perumal comes to Coimbatore every weekend from Bangalore where he works as an IT professional. The other two work in a similar profession in Coimbatore.

“We all hold 9-5 jobs. It is a routine life. These interviews have become a stress buster for us. We become inspired” , explains Mrinalini. There have been times when they did five posts a week, and on other weeks they do one. The goal is to post at least one story about a talented person.

The three approach such people on Facebook and Google and try to get their story out through their Facebook page ‘People of Coimbatore.’ Friends, family and others also refer them to more people. “Sometimes the person we interview introduces us to more people, it is a growing network” said Mrinalini.

“We don’t really have a criterion while deciding on who to interview. Our very aim was to bring forward people who wouldn’t be talked about otherwise,” she adds.

Mrinalini says that for her, the first few interviews were very hard. “We didn’t really know what to ask, how to ask. People were also very hesitant to talk with us. But we learnt as time went by and now its really really fun.”

“The three of us go for interviews together. When we get back, we sit together and discuss. We find out the one interesting bit in the interview to focus on. These discussions are sometimes more fun than the actual interview.”

One of the major challenges that the trio face is time constraints. Since they all hold regular jobs, they can only follow their passion on weekends. But sometimes they would have personal engagements then, or maybe they’ll have to work a Saturday at their office. Sometimes the person they planned to interview wouldn’t have time for them.

Financial constraints are another challenge. Though the trio aren’t doing this for profit, they feel that with financial support they could have done much more. “It would take care of our expenses. We would be able to get better equipment and hire a proof reader. But not many are into what we do” said Mrinalini adding that though they weren’t particularly looking into expanding now, they are certainly open to the idea.

Check out their page at: People of Coimbatore

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