Indore: Made In Heaven: A fairytale with happy ending

Indore: When love takes over, everything else moulds and falls into place forming the perfect set up for a fairytale. Overlooking their religious differences, 32-year-old chief executive officer at an HR firm Madhuri Balpande and 32-year-old national head at NSDC, Ankur Sharma finally
found their fairytale ending with togetherness. Sharing their story, Madhuri said, “We did our MBA from NIILM School of Business, Delhi where we first met.” While she was a regular student with a practical mindset, he inspired her to become a chartered accountant as well as masters in business.

“Most of us did not even know that he studied in our college till a teacher’s day celebration. Me and my best friend Shilpy Roy were decorating
for the celebration, when another friend (Ankur Pancholi) suggested that CA (Sharma’s popular name in college) would help us in decoration,” Madhuri said. “Neither of us had seen or heard of him before, but that day when he came to help us, something clicked and three of us– Shilpy, Ankur and I became the best of friends,” Madhuri said. The trio would party and hangout frequently in popular places at Lodhi garden, shop at Lajpat Nagar and enjoy ‘shorma’.

“Madhuri was crowned Miss Fresher and she was truly the most beautiful girl inside out,” Sharma said. Ensuring that she gets home safely, he
drove 40 kilometres to drop her home at Rohini in a chilly night of December in Delhi. “I had feelings for him and I could not stop myself from telling him despite knowing that he had a girlfriend back in Indore,” Madhuri said. Though he admired her, he remained loyal to his girlfriend. “I do not quit easily on relations and definitely not get diverted by attraction, so I was with my girlfriend but eventually after a year, long distance relation did not work out as we had frequent fights,” Sharma said.

“On my birthday, we went to celebrate at Delhi Haat. We were sitting and having some snacks when he went down to his knees and proposed
to marry me,” Madhuri said. When she was sharing the news with her father (architect Ramesh Balpande), he too admitted to have chosen the same guy for her. But, “Twist in the story was that my mother (homemaker Usha Balpande) was against the proposal entirely,” Madhuri said. Usha feared conservativeness in Brahmin family following the stereotype. Completing her education, Madhuri took a job and so did Sharma.

“People generally get married young in my family and knowing that I am settled and in love with Madhuri, my parents urged me to tie the knot after a year,” Sharma said. While most relatives played villain, Madhuri’s maternal uncle Prakash Kalbande convinced her mother to give the family a chance. “He (Prakash) had collected information about the family beforehand and when we went to meet them, it was truly a fairytale,” she said. Sharma family won their heart with their frank and unselfish behaviour.

“The fairy godmother of the tale in my story is my mother-in-law (Anju Sharma) who taught me everything and supports me in my ambitions as well,” Madhuri said. From learning cooking to handling the house, she learnt everything and lives blissfully with her in-laws, who support her.