IN AN effort to promote India's national game 'Hockey' over cricket, the e-book, "Sansarpur to London Olympics", was launched by the Indian Army Chief, V K Singh. Sansarpur, which is also known as the Mecca of Hockey, has produced 14 Hockey Olympic players since the 1932 US Olympics, and one of them is the writer of the book Col. (Retd) Balbir Singh Kular.
At the launch, General, V K Singh and Col. Balbir Singh shared many past moments - how they played against each other, and how that match was lost by Col. Balbir Singh, which he admited humbly was because of his mistake. He also shared a memory of an another unforgettable match with Pakistan in the Olympics, which they won without having their best players in the team in semifinal.
“My autobiography, From Sansarpur to London Olympics, is a sincere attempt to chronicle my life, on and off the field. Aided by newspaper clipings, official letters and formal exchanges for over half a century, this humble effort is aimed at hockey aficionados on various landmarks of Indian hockey, in the past six decades,” said Col. Singh He further added “I have been fortunate to have been continuously a part of various historic events in the past six decades of Indian hockey, and now the time is right to share it in exact entirety”.
Co-authored by sports film maker Sunil Yash Kalra, this is a unique book of personal memoir, with interesting compilation of stories, funny anecdotes, sensational revelations and heart-warming vignettes of his life in the Army, and as a hockey player and coach. The book is a treasure-trove of rare photographs, some of which date back to the days of the ‘Wizard of Hockey’, Maj Dhyan Chand. In places, it reads like a thriller, at others like an intimate autobiography.
Launched in digital format, the e-version is priced at Rs 95, and available exclusively on handygo technologies's web portal for e-book applications RockASAP.com. The book is the first ever sports book in the country to be launched on this platform, and is not only available on all Smartphones and Tablets but also on all GPRS-enabled mobile handsets - thus reaching out to a large section of mobile phone users.
Dipanker Mukherjee, COO, handygo Technologies, present at the launch, said, “We are really happy to launch Col. Balbir’s masterpiece, India’s first sports book on e-book platform on India’s first M-Commerce application RockASAP.com. We will be promoting ‘Sansarpur to London Olympics’ on our website for our existing and prospective customers. This book is a must read for all age groups and now with the advent of mobile telephony everything has become on the go. This generation on the go reads, writes, and reacts, networks…..on the Go!! and would be our key target customers for this book.”
"Along with its basic functionalities it also works as ‘an e-book reader’, a library where you keep your digital books and magazines ready and use it as and when you feel like, and most importantly it helps the ‘publishing industry’ reduce piracy as the application comes with an in-built DRM, specially developed by handygo Technologies, which allows a user only to download a Book and Read it. You just can’t transfer it; take a printout or share with others,” added Mukherjee.
RockASAP.com is India’s first m-commerce applications platform, and RockASAP.com’s ‘E-Book’ search engine will empower users to search for their favorite books, authors and products from a wide collection of digital books available at RockASAP.com. Handygo has tied-up with more than 40 publishers as well as various national and international authors in various categories for its ‘E-Books’ section to bring in the best reading experience to its users within a click. Users can download more than 500 books, priced 40% - 50% less than the paperback editions.
At the launch, Anjum Chopra, a woman Test cricketer and cricket commentator; Zaffar Iqbal, Olympic Hockey gold medalist and Chef-de-Mission of London Olympics 2012; and Olympic medalists Ajit Pal Singh and Harbinder Singh, were also present.
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