Abhishek Jain: IAS officer and world champion in typewriting; “Typewriter is an extension of my body”

“And talking of typing contests, these days the name of a certain 13-year-old boy (Abhishek Jain) keeps popping up”, ---Blitz, August 17, 1991
“While most of the world was preparing for Atlanta (Olympics), Abhishek Jain was going for the gold in Germany – as the fastest typist in the world” --`TIME’ magazine, USA, August 26, 1996
This Abhishek Jain is a 2002 batch Himachal Pradesh cadre IAS and is currently working as collector in Una district. But for most of his friends and colleagues, he is more a three-time world typing champion than an administrator. His typing speed? 135 words per minute! Jain hails from…
Goraya, a tiny village of Punjab’s Jalandhar district. As a seven-year-old boy, Jain started fiddling with the keyboard of the typewriter, and he represented India in the World Speed Typing Championships held at Brussels in 1991. He was then just 13 years old.
Jain won the gold medal speed typing (junior) with a record speed of 546 strokes (109.2 words) per minute with 99.95% accuracy. In 1993, he broke his own record and improved the speed to 117 words per minute with 99.92% accuracy. Though he participated in the junior category, he ended up securing more points than all those who competed in the senior category. Jain was then adjusted the World Champion for both junior and senior categories, a rare record. In 1995, he won the world typing championships for the third time. That competition was held in Amsterdam (Netherlands).
Later, in electronic typing, he achieved a record of typing of 135 words per minute. He also finds a place in the Limca Book of Records as the youngest-fastest world typing champion.
A BCom, a company secretary, MA in economics and post graduate diploma in rural development, Jain got into IAS in 2002.
Beginning his administrative career as an assistant commission and BDO in Solan district, he was SDO in Palampur, assistant deputy commissioner in Kullu, special secretary in horticulture and labour departments, and then deputy Commissioner in Himachal Pradesh’s Hamirpur district.
He is currently the deputy commissioner in Una district at the rank of a director.
Jain has already been featured in many national and international newspapers and magazines for his typewriting fete. India Today began an article on him (dated January 15, 1992) saying: “He’s got flying fingers”. In that article young Jain was quoted as saying —“The typewriter is an extension of my body. I get the same thrill that Kapil Dev gets from cricket”.