Life / In my own words
Love, a few wrong turns, the people who stood by me, and one question that refused to leave.
Begin the journey ↓
Chapter 01
I ran away once — in 10th standard — for an intense, reckless infatuation. My home was loving, but I was a teenager who believed feelings were bigger than rules and consequences. That experience revealed a part of me: intense, stubborn, all-in. Years later, some of that storm would find its way into Pravash.
Chapter 02
After that chapter, I entered a new school and met Amisha. Her faith in me made me want to become someone I respected. It brought me back to education, and eventually to a Master of Science from BITS, Pilani. During my bachelor’s studies in Bangalore, I worked as a Pizza Hut cashier for ₹20 an hour to pay for long-distance calls to her. We married in 2009, after ten years of friendship and relationship.
Chapter 03
My parents, Dinesh and Mina Shah, and my siblings Kanan and Dipen have been a quiet fortress around me. My mother’s Jain faith and her writing against animal cruelty taught me a compassion that would later become central to my stories. My brother has always treated me like his first son, helping me find my way forward.
Chapter 04
In 2010, our first pregnancy ended in loss. Amisha’s health challenges and the years that followed tested us deeply. In 2019, we decided to move forward with adoption. Then life surprised us: on 1 January 2020, our son Soham was born. The quieter rhythm of the COVID years gave me unexpected time with my family, and space to write.
Chapter 05
On a family pilgrimage in 2012, through Ayodhyapuram and Palitana in Gujarat, my cousin Bharat Doshi spoke about Jain cosmology and Jambudveep architecture. At first, I laughed at what I did not understand. But his conviction stayed with me. Back in Bangalore, I began researching alongside my technology work, meeting scholars, listening, questioning, and learning.
Chapter 06
The Vishnu Puran, Harivansh Puran, and Tattvartha Sutra led me towards recurring cosmological patterns. I became fascinated by the gap between the words we recite and the worlds they describe. Teaching children through Sath, an organisation supporting orphaned girls, also changed how I understood service, compassion, good, and evil.
Chapter 07
I had always wanted to write about my adventurous life. Now I could braid those experiences with my research. Amish Tripathi’s Shiva Trilogy and Jeffrey Archer’s storytelling helped me see how a world could come alive on the page. Bharat Kshetra — The Hidden Matrix became my debut: lived reality woven into a cosmology-driven story universe.
From my photograph albums
A few memories from my College Days album — the friendships and moments that belong to the years before the career, the books, and everything that followed.
Another kind of team spirit
I represented India at the 2024 Indoor Cricket World Series. Sport is another chapter in a life shaped by commitment, teamwork, and the courage to begin.
Recognition & milestones