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Katihar, a small town in Bihar, is today providing tech support to public and private sector firms in California - thanks to the efforts of Silicon Valley entrepreneur Ravi Verma.
Verma, who hails from Katihar, around 350 km from Patna, is the CEO of Telecommand Software and Services in the Silicon Valley that maintains the Entrepreneur Resource Planning (ERP) systems of the state of California.
ERP systems integrate all data and processes of an organisation into a single unified system.
"I am from Katihar. I invested some dollars here because I feel charity should begin at home. It was my childhood dream to do something for my native place," Verma, said.
According to Verma, Telecommand provides IT consulting and support to both public and private sectors in Sacramento county and wider northern California areas.
Verma, who is in his 30's, said he was proud of running a successful software development centre in Katihar. "Not many thought it could actually happen. I chose Katihar to prove that one can make a difference."
He started his business in this town in December 2005 and it was a profitable venture right from day one. "California is our premier customer and our Katihar team works hard to maintain its systems. Our team in Katihar works as though they are sitting in the US itself."
The biggest challenge for Verma was to motivate the people in Katihar. He hired software engineers belonging to the town who had gone to cities like Bangalore and Mumbai in search of work.
Verma also set up the R.S College of Computer Science and Engineering in Katihar in July.
"I hope other NRIs also do something for their hometowns or home districts," said Verma, a graduate from IIT Kanpur who migrated to the US in 1994-95.
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