For many people, English is not simply another skill to learn. It can influence whether someone gets a job, speaks confidently in an interview, participates in a classroom, or feels comfortable communicating in a professional environment. Rakhi Kumaran saw this reality repeatedly during her years in the customer service and training industries. She also noticed another problem: many people who were being rejected because of weak communication skills could not afford the courses available to improve them.
That observation eventually became the foundation of Book It English Speaking Class, a venture focused on making English language training more accessible while retaining a structured and practical approach to learning. With 22 years of professional experience spanning customer service and Learning and Development, Kumaran has built her work around a straightforward belief: language should not be the reason for being rejected.
From English Literature to the International BPO Industry
Kumaran’s professional journey began after completing her English Literature Honours education at Wilson College in 2004. Rather than moving directly into teaching, she began her career as a Customer Service Associate in the international BPO industry. Over six years, she worked with various clients based abroad, gaining first-hand exposure to the importance of communication in professional environments.
Her experience in customer service also gave her an opportunity to observe a recurring pattern. People with the necessary ability and potential were sometimes rejected because they struggled to communicate effectively. What stood out to her was not only the communication gap itself, but also what candidates told her afterwards: the courses that could help them were often too expensive for them.
This experience became an important influence on the direction of her career. Kumaran eventually moved into the Training function and spent nearly 15 years working with Learning and Development teams. That period allowed her to develop experience in training and skill development before she eventually applied that knowledge to her own venture.
The First Chapter of Book It English Speaking Class
Book It English Speaking Class was originally founded in February 2013 in Vasai, Mumbai. The venture emerged from Kumaran’s interest in addressing the communication challenges she had encountered throughout her professional career.
However, the first chapter did not continue uninterrupted. In 2015, Kumaran paused the venture to focus on her newborn baby. The decision meant stepping away from something she had started, but it did not eliminate the underlying purpose behind it.
Years later, that idea returned in a different form. After completing four years of service with Amazon’s Learning and Development team, Kumaran left the organisation and restarted Book It in July 2024. Her corporate experience had by then given her a broader understanding of training, communication and professional development, which she could bring into her own classroom.
The result has been a second phase of Book It’s journey that combines her industry experience with a direct focus on English language development.
A Training Model Built Around Practical Application
Kumaran’s approach is based on the principle that a skill has limited value if it is never applied. At Book It English Speaking Class, practical application begins from Day 1, rather than being treated as something that comes only after students complete their lessons.
The training is organised across multiple levels. The Foundation Course covers phonics, conversational skills and grammar and is designed for students aged five and above, including learners who cannot yet read or speak English. The Basic Level 1 introduces grammar for students from Grade 1 to Grade 9, alongside pronunciation, vocabulary and public speaking. The objective is to help students develop enough confidence to construct basic sentences in English.
The Intermediate Level 2 is intended for learners who can already make basic sentences but struggle with more complex communication. The curriculum places greater emphasis on conversational and written English, while also incorporating vocabulary, pronunciation and public speaking. It further introduces practical areas such as mock interviews, business etiquette and dining etiquette. At the Advanced Level 3, equivalent to an IELTS-focused course, students work on accent neutralization, vocabulary, pronunciation, public speaking, debates, objection handling, podcasts, blogging, review writing and creative writing.
Making English Training More Accessible
Affordability is central to Kumaran’s motivation for running Book It. Her experience in the customer service industry showed her that the need for communication training was not limited to people who could comfortably pay for premium courses.
Her stated objective is therefore not simply to provide English-speaking classes, but to make them affordable without compromising the methodology or quality of training. This positions Book It around two connected priorities: accessibility and structured learning.
The approach also reflects Kumaran’s view that students should receive more than a superficial sense of progress. She believes language training should take a holistic approach and that assessments should genuinely test a learner’s ability rather than create an artificial sense of accomplishment through tests that are too easy to clear.
For her, completing a course should mean developing an ability that can actually be used beyond the classroom.
A Classroom Serving Different Stages of Life
Book It’s student base reflects the broad role communication skills can play at different stages of education and employment. Kumaran works with students as young as five years old, while also training college students, homemakers, people preparing to enter the workforce, working professionals and individuals planning to move overseas for further studies or work.
According to the student distribution shared by Kumaran, approximately 60% of her students come from school or college. Another 20% are people seeking employment, while working professionals account for 10%. The remaining 10% are stay-at-home mothers looking to enhance their skills while their children are at school.
This mix means that the classroom is not built around a single type of learner or a single motivation. For a school student, the priority may be confidence and sentence construction. For a job seeker, it may involve interviews and professional communication. For someone preparing to move overseas, the requirements can extend to more advanced speaking, writing and presentation skills.
Kumaran trains students according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) standardization, giving the learning process a structured framework.
Turning Experience Into Measurable Growth
Since restarting Book It in July 2024, Kumaran has tracked the venture’s progress through its inquiry and enrolment process. Over the stated period of two years and two months, she enrolled 233 students from 345 students who went through the inquiry process, representing a reported conversion rate of 67.53%.
Beyond enrolment figures, another indicator has become increasingly visible in the classroom’s demand. Kumaran says the Foundation Course regularly runs out of seats, with students reserving places months before they can begin. The Basic Course is also being booked nearly two months in advance.
For a trainer, demand can be measured in more than registrations. Kumaran particularly values the comments and appreciation messages students have left through WhatsApp and her Google page. Over the three months preceding her response to the Youth Chronicle questionnaire, she also observed students travelling from nearly 30 kilometres away to attend her classes.
That willingness to travel has become a meaningful personal milestone for Kumaran. It indicates that students are looking beyond proximity when choosing where to develop their communication skills.
Lessons From Building the Business
The path has not been without operational challenges. In the first year, payment defaulters became one of the biggest difficulties for the venture. This remained an issue despite Kumaran offering discounts and payment plans to make enrolment easier for students.
Her response was to change the terms around those offers. She began nullifying the offers for people who failed to make payments on time, after which the number of payment defaulters reduced.
The experience reflects an aspect of entrepreneurship that exists alongside teaching itself: building a sustainable system requires clear boundaries. The venture’s focus may be education, but maintaining a functioning educational business also requires decisions around pricing, payment discipline and operating policies.
For Kumaran, another important lesson is the value of research and genuine interest in the work. Her advice to aspiring entrepreneurs and young professionals is concise: research thoroughly, and most importantly, be passionate about the work.
From One Classroom Toward a Larger Vision
Kumaran’s ambitions for Book It extend beyond its current classroom model. Over the next five years, she would like to transform the venture from a single classroom into an entire building with at least five classrooms dedicated to English-speaking skills.
The expansion would represent more than a physical increase in capacity. It would allow the venture to accommodate the different categories of learners already coming through its doors while creating greater scope for structured language training.
At the centre of that vision is a broader mission. Kumaran believes that communication ability should open opportunities rather than become a barrier to them. Her work is therefore rooted in a problem she first observed in the customer service industry and has continued to address through training: people should not be rejected simply because they have not yet developed the language skills required to express their capabilities.
A Career That Came Back to Its Original Purpose
Rakhi Kumaran’s journey with Book It English Speaking Class has unfolded across more than a decade, with a significant pause and a later restart shaped by professional experience. Her transition from an international BPO customer service role to nearly 15 years in Learning and Development, followed by four years with Amazon’s Learning and Development team, gave her a substantial training background before she returned to entrepreneurship.
The venture’s current direction brings those experiences together. Its courses span foundational phonics and grammar through advanced communication, public speaking, debates, professional etiquette, writing and interview preparation. Its students range from young learners to professionals and people preparing for opportunities overseas.
Kumaran’s story ultimately comes back to the problem that first caught her attention: communication can determine whether an opportunity is accessible. Through Book It, she is working to make English training practical and affordable, while building a model in which students are expected to use what they learn. Her five-classroom vision points toward the next stage of that effort, but the underlying purpose remains the same: language should not be the reason for being rejected.
