Amar Chitra Katha: Preserving
India's Heritage

chillibreeze writer — Suchismita Pai

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A standard feature of Suma’s annual visit to India is the Amar Chitra Katha she buys for her eleven year old daughter Ananya. “She has more than a hundred and fifty of these books. I started buying them for her when she was about six, and add new titles every trip. It is a great, easily digestible way to educate her about India. Living as we do in the US, it is sort of a substitute for grandma’s stories and history textbooks rolled into one. I grew up reading them and the stories were so much easier to remember with the visual support.”

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Ever since Anant Pai created Amar Chitra Katha or the ‘Eternal Picture Story’, these easy to understand, illustrated books have caught the imagination of the young and the old alike. “Even if you know the story, it is fun to refresh your memory with the help of the colorful visuals”, says Amita, who now reads these to her young grandson. “Also, they are short and sweet, while keeping the soul of the story intact. Good things in small packages, for the reader as well as the listener”, says the veteran of many bedtime stories.

Its origins
It was the inability of school children to answer simple questions on Indian mythology on a quiz show that galvanized Anant Pai to create these books in this format. Bringing together a team of wonderful writers like Kamala Chandrakant, Margie Sastry, Subba Rao, Debrani Mitra and C.R Sharma, Anant Pai donned the role of editor and co-writer on most scripts. The notable illustrators, other than Ram Waeerkar, were Dilip Kadam, Sanjeev Waeerkar, Souren Roy, C.D Rane, Geoffrey Fowler and Pratap Mullick.

As the epic stories became more popular, the team began to publish stories based on Indian history, of men and women belonging to different regions and religions and also stories based on Sanskrit as well as regional classics and local folklore. The continuous popularity of the comics led to reprints being issued frequently, and the back-issues remained in print. Translations in Bengali, Marathi, Assamese, Gujarati, Punjabi, Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit and Urdu were available by the mid-eighties and were selling half a million copies a month. Some titles were also translated into French, Spanish, German, Swahili, Fijian, Indonesian, and Serbo-Croat.

Its evolution
Over time, in the mid-nineties, the books have evolved into sleeker and more durable editions, with thick cardstock covers and better color separations. The marketing strategy has also maximized the reach of these books. Today, Amar Chitra Katha is available not only across all major book retailers, hundreds of small bookstores, but even on railway platforms. In 2007, the publishers created a new online store that offers all the titles with shipping worldwide.

Launched at a time when Indian society was slowly moving away from the traditional joint family system, Amar Chitra Katha took on the task of story telling that generally fell to extended family members. The choice of English as a medium ensured that it reached the urban, English-medium educated children.

What makes it so special?
Apart from the engaging content and treatment, the detailed research of architecture, costumes, regional flavors and facts in the books was done dexterously. It enabled both parents and teachers to use the books as educational aids. To some extent, these books have helped increase inter-provincial awareness throughout the country. Critics describe the stories as often simplistic, excessively Indophilic, and caution against them being considered as "history". “That may be, but where else could one see that the clothes worn by ‘Kannagi’ were different from ‘Rani Padmini’, or that spiritual leaders like Guru Nanak and Adi Shankaracharya were dressed differently? These are things that you pick up at a glance and which can be missed in a descriptive history text,” notes Jaya, a teacher and grandmother.

An educational supplement
India has such diversity that it is difficult to comprehend through text books alone. Amar Chitra Katha makes it easy for someone living in Kerala to know about heroes of Assam. It tells you about Ajanta and Ellora Caves as well as the Konark Sun temple in small bites.

Amar Chitra Katha has kept pace with time and is now available digitally as well, from online access to mobile phones. Amar Chitra Katha comics have even been adapted for the iPhone platform. Adopting the latest technology while talking about ancient history, these books have stood the test of time and reach out to people from all walks of life. They have created a niche for themselves as they educate and entertain generations of readers across the globe.

 

Chillibreeze's disclaimer: This is a contributed article and was published on Chillibreeze in March, 2010. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the views of Chillibreeze as a company. Chillibreeze has a strict anti-plagiarism policy. Please contact us to report any copyright issues related to this article. The relevance of the facts and figures cited (if any) could change after a period of time.

 

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Amar Chitra Katha & Indian History
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Amar Chitra Katha: Preserving India’s Heritage

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—About our writer: With Postgraduate degrees in Business administration, Economics and Journalism, Suchismita Pai has worked in Advertising and copywriting. She has also worked in the software industry and currently straddles the corporate and creative writing worlds. Marriage, family, pets and travel have added to her real life perspective. She currently works out of Pune.

 

 

 

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