Tenali Raman - A character that kids enjoy

Wit, wisdom, humour, mischief - all bundled into one - that's Tenali Raman. He was the court Jester in the Vijayanagara Empire in South India. Raman obtained his wisdom with the Blessings of Kali Devi. His stories often reflect his brilliance, and ability to solve problems. 

Children's Books by Ramakrishna Math

Shri Ramakrishna Math has brought out a large collection of books especially for children. Covering a host of epics and tales from our Indian Culture and Heritage, these are a must buy for children.
Recently, they have launched an online store too. Visit the same at http://www.chennaimath.org/istore/category/english-books/kids/

Shikari Shambu - The World's Most Famous Hunter (?!)

(Shambu is a cowardly and lazy shikari (hunter) whom the rest of the world perceives as courageous. He always tries to run away from dangerous animals, but due to some stroke of luck always ends up as a hero. He lives with his wife Shanti. In The Legend of Shikari Shambu , it was revealed that Shambu, before being called "Shikari" Shambu, fell on a tiger and knocked him out. It was after this incident that he got the name "Shikari" Shambu.

But, contrary to the name, the creators ensured that Shambu never would shoot or kill any animal in any of its episodes. More than that, creators slowly even disassociated him from his trademark hunting gun, after few episodes. The "non-violence" policy of Tinkle also resulted in Shambhu being portrayed as more of an explorer than a hunter.

Enjoy the episodes of Shikari Shambu!

Birbal The Wise

Birbal was a Hindu advisor in the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar during his rule in India and is mostly remembered in folk tales, which focus on his wit. He belonged to the Brahmin class and was appointed by the Emperor as a poet and singer around 1556–1562, later formed a close association with him, becoming an important advisor. Birbal was extremely clever and witty. Being surrounded by envious Muslim courtiers; these tales involve him outsmarting them and sometimes even the Emperor, using only his intelligence and cunning, often with giving witty and humorous responses and impressing the Emperor.
Let children enjoy the wit and wisdom of Birbal.

IndiaBookStore.net -a super simple search engine for books

IndiaBookStore.net is a super quick and simple search engine for books that helps you find the price and availability of books across various online bookstores. It also provides user store reviews, which further help users to choose the best deal on the right store. The IndiaBookStore.net blog Bookish is _the_ destination for bibliophiles. It provides users book reviews, author interviews, articles by published authors, book releases, information on literary events, interesting articles that trigger your nerves to think and more. IndiaBookStore.net will hopefully help you find your book, and save some money to top it off. :)

Access the site at www.indiabookstore.net 

Amazon for India

Yet another player who has recently entered the Indian Market is www.amazon.in.
The world's largest online retailer Amazon has finally made a formal entry into the fast growing Indian e-commerce market. The US-based online retailer quietly announced today the launch of its flagship selling platform for Indian buyers — www.amazon.in, alongside a service for domestic retailers wanting to generate online sales (Selling on Amazon) and a delivery service for third-party vendors (Fulfillment by Amazon) with no back-end infrastructure.

Amar Chitra Katha - A great collection for kids

The comic series was started by Anant Pai in an attempt to teach Indian children about their cultural heritage. He was shocked that Indian students could answer questions on Greek and Roman mythology, but were ignorant of their own history, mythology and folklore. It so happened that a quiz contest aired on Doordarshan in February 1967, in which participants could easily answer questions pertaining to Greek mythology, but were unable to reply to the question "In the Ramayana, who was Rama's mother?"

It is the best-selling children's publication in most large format stores.
In 2007, the publisher created a new online store that offers all the titles with shipping worldwide. The titles are divided in following categories

• Fables & Folktales (e.g. Panchatantra)
• Mythology (e.g. The Ramayana)
• The Epics (e.g. The Mahabaratha)
• Humour & wit (e.g. Birbal)
• Biographies (e.g. Mahatma Gandhi)
• Literary Classics
• 3 in 1 Titles
• 5 in 1 Titles
• Special Issues

ACK & Indian Culture

Amar Chitra Katha was launched at a time when Indian society was slowly moving away from the traditional joint family system, because of (among other things) socio-economic constraints and urbanization. In a joint family system, grandparents would regale the children of the household with tales from folklore and the epics, and the Amar Chitra Katha series served to fill the void left by grandparents in the smaller nuclear families in urban areas. The choice of English as the primary language led it to reach the majority of children who studied in English medium schools.

Later, when the comic added historical topics, it proved very helpful to students. For most, Indian history, a jumble of names and dates, came alive as stories. The detailed research of architecture, costumes, regional flavours and facts ensured that the comics were widely accepted into the mainstream, both parents and teachers using them as educational aids. To an extent, these books, with their homogenized and unbiased character descriptions went a long way in promoting national integration and increasing inter-provincial awareness throughout the country.

It should be mentioned that the series steered clear of controversy, taming down content and violence and adhering to strict self-censorship.