As Google goes through a massive change by creating a new larger holding company Alphabet, everyone in India has their eyes set on the company’s new 43 year-old CEO – Sundar Pichai.

Hundreds and thousands of people rejoiced on social media when India-born Pichai ascended to the most powerful job at the world’s biggest technology company Google.

Pichai, born as Pichai Sundararajan grew up in a two-room apartment with his parents Lakshmi and Regunatha in Madras (present day Chennai) in the Indian state of Tamilnadu.

He holds a Bachelor in Technology degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, a Masters from Stanford University and a MBA from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Pichai, who was relatively unknown in most of India saw much love from his home country and state after the promotion.

His Wikipedia article saw a massive edit war — between two groups of two different schools — claiming from he graduated from their alma mater before he joined the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.

Pichai’s vision

Soon after joining Google in 2004, Pichai became the force behind the annual developer conference Google’s I/O, and he led product management of Google Chrome, Chrome OS and Google Drive.

Read more: globalvoicesonline.org – Written by Subhashish Panigrahi