Title: The Boy Who Wrote A Constitution
Author: Rajesh Talwar
Illustrator: Niharika Singh
Publisher: Ponytale Books
Type: Paperback
Pages: 156
Age group: 8 – 12 years
This is the review written by my 11 year old son, Medhansh Dwivedi.
I enjoy reading books around history, and this book, ‘The Boy Who Wrote A Constitution’ came as a lovely surprise to me. I have always been curious to know more about Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, and that is why I was more than delighted to receive this non fiction book as a review copy.
The book describes the discrimination Dr. Ambedkar faced during his life including childhood and how he overcame all of it and achieved a lot more. Now the question is why was he discriminated? That is because he was from the lowest of all four castes, the untouchable or the Dalit caste. During his time, India was struggling with its self made Hindu caste system and Dalits were treated badly. In fact, not just Hindus but even Muslims and Christians also discriminated the untouchables. Read the book to know more on this.
This book made me feel sad sometimes about the caste system and how Dalits were treated then. But I was also amazed by B.R. Ambedkar feats despite all the odds. Very inspiring!
The characters which I liked in the book are Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, his brother and sister, the Maharaja of Baroda and Dr. Ambedkar’s teacher because they motivated him at different stages of life and helped him through his journey.
As the book is in a play format, it has thirteen scenes. I would compare this book with my last read, The Magnificent Monuments of India – The Taj Mahal as both are non fiction, quite informative, especially from India’s context and interesting enough to keep me hooked till the end.
What I enjoyed most about this book is that the story was put across in a play format and the characters’ conversations were very engaging . Also I liked how the author described Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s life story in a fun and gripping manner despite the struggles he went through. I also liked the way the author mentioned bits of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s life instead of writing the full life story, otherwise it would have been a biography. So you get to know a lot about this great man in just a few pages and in an interesting way.
If I had to rate the book out of ten stars, I would give it 8 because some parts like the discrimination bit made me feel sad about the story.
A must read for sure!
THE BOY WHO FOUGHT AN EMPIRE – about Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose is another book in this series. Medhansh has shared a video review of this book in our kbc fb group here while his mom, Rakshita has shared some inside pages as well. Quoting her:
“Not always you find a book written in a play format, that is how Rajesh Talwar wrote this engaging life story on our fav Netaji. It beautifully captures Subhash Chandra Bose’s life story from a boy to an adult. For a 12 year old this certainly seemed interesting. The book has been divided into Scenes and has conversational style flow…making the story vivid & real.
As a parent I feel it is good for kids who love to read about Indian heroes, historical information or have interest in Indian history specially the independence movement era. Age wise a matured 10 year old to 15 year can easily engage.
I however felt few pics here and there could have been added in the book.”
If you enjoyed this review and wish to buy the book from Amazon (kbc affiliate link),
CLICK & BUY NOW!Disclaimer: Medhansh is part of the #kbcReviewerSquad and received this book as a review copy from the publisher via kbc.
