Kishore Singh: Other books

If there's one lesson children can learn from former president K R Narayanan's life, it is that adversity can be overcome with determination.

How else would a young lad from the boondocks of Kerala with hardly any money to pay for his education go on to seek a prestigious Tata scholarship that would take him to London, join the foreign service, make it as ambassador to USA, the VC of Jawaharlal Nehru University, win three consecutive elections, and finally hold the office of Vice President, then President, of India?

Even though he was held in affectionate esteem, too little is known about Narayanan's life, and Alaka Shankar does a creditable job of piecing together his humble beginnings using anecdotes to illustrate his early life.

His scholarship and love of language made him one of the most erudite of Presidents in recent years. A protege of Prime Minister Nehru, Narayanan played a critical role on assignment in China.

However, his badge of "untouchability" did not leave him even when he occupied Rashtrapati Bhawan, and though he perfunctorily dismissed the French paper Le Figaro's headline: "An untouchable at the Elysee Palace" when he toured Paris, it erupted into a gigantic controversy.

For most part Shankar's book is concise, but the latter half tends to be didactic, and the tone is professorial rather than intimate. Clearly overawed by her subject, Shankar would also have done well to have used an easier column width than the full span of the page that makes it difficult to read for any length of time.

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Portrait of a President
K R Narayanan
Alaka Shankar, Children's Book Trust
Pages: 248/Price: Rs 120