Author Pervin Saket has collaborated with four different illustrators to create children’s books around the lives of P.T. Usha, Bhakti Sharma, Arunima Sinha, and Chandro and Prakashi Tomar. These sports women are role models for the young.

Pune-based poet and novelist Pervin Saket is out with a set of four children’s books about sportswomen who have made India proud – athlete P.T. Usha, swimmer Bhakti Sharma, mountaineer Arunima Sinha, and sharpshooters Chandro and Prakashi Tomar. The whole project was conceptualized by Chitwan Mittal of AdiDev Press in Kolkata. Ashwitha Jayakumar collaborated on the research, and a team of four illustrators – Rajyasree Sarkar, Prerna Roy, Aparajitha Vaasudev, and Ria Mohta joined in to bring these stories to life.

The titles of the books – Trust with P.T. Usha, Resilience with Bhakti Sharma, Adaptability with Arunima Sinha, and Transformation with Chandro and Prakashi Tomar – highlight values that make these women stand out, and therefore serve as role models especially for girls who want to shine in sports but face various kinds of societal barriers. Hopefully, these books will also sensitize boys who grow up in patriarchal settings that normalize prejudice and discrimination towards girls and women not only in sports but in all walks of life.