CHENNAI: We the people of India…’ the Preamble to the Constitution of India is considered the heart and soul of the country’s structure. It is probably the only part of the supreme rulebook which is most read owing to the numerous prints of the page in school textbooks. But have you ever chanced upon the original, handwritten book?
The original copy of the Indian Constitution, written in English and Hindi, are kept in helium-filled cases in the Library of the Parliament of India and 1,000 photolithographic reproductions were given to the 300-odd members of the Constituent Assembly, chief ministers and the court libraries, about 70 years ago. Today, most of these originals are untraceable and the odds of us getting our hands on them are near to nil. Vijay Anand, part of Chennai Tricolor Initiative, in an attempt to give people a taste of how the original ‘Constitution of India’ looked, is on a quest to replicate it.
As we enter Vijay’s office at Thiruvanmayur, we notice A3 sheets, printed with the 25 parts of the Constitution neatly arranged on his work table. With the original colours remastered, handwritten-flowing italic style calligraphy, traced and improved to precision and original illustrations done by artists from Shantiniketan on each page, laboriously redone, the papers give us a peek into how the original might have looked. “The original book was handwritten by Prem Behari Narain Raizada and the book was illustrated and decorated by artists from Shantiniketan,” says Vijay, showing us a vintage photograph of Prem writing the book.
Once the draft of the book was done, Prem was approached by Jawaharlal Nehru for handwriting it. “He didn’t charge a penny for the job. Instead, he requested that he write his name on every page of the book,” says Vijay as he points to the bottom corner of one of the pages which reads ‘PREM’.
Talking about his pet project-turned-obsession, Vijay recalls, “About four years ago, a lawyer friend hinted about the Constitution book, and ever since, I have been intrigued to know more about it. There are so many people who don’t even know that such a book exists…we are so used to seeing clauses, acts and amendments in our textbooks that we’ve forgotten about the original.”
Two years ago when Vijay came across a news stating that one of the original books was being auctioned in London for `40 lakh, he knew he had to act upon it. His goal was to find at least one, before they were all auctioned off or worse, damaged.
After months of research, he stumbled upon one in a library in Bengaluru. “I wanted a copy of the book but that was a far-fetched dream. So, I used the version available in the World Digital Library as a point of reference, and from my first-hand experience of holding a hard copy of an original in Bengaluru, to replicate it. Until I saw the book, I didn’t even know its dimensions,” he says.
It took Vijay nearly two years to recreate the book, which he refers to as a ‘piece of artwork’. “The book fundamentally is a beautiful piece of art and a historical treasure which deserves to be saved. When the book was written, most of the country was fairly uninformed and people didn’t understand what was happening. People need to have access to it,” he shares.
While the making of the replica has been physically, mentally and monetarily grueling for Vijay, he oozes optimism and enthusiasm as he talks about the output. “If a person from today’s generation finds an original of the book, they might think that the book always looked this way, with plain colours, but that’s not the case. The page borders had colours like blue and yellow to it. Back then, lithos had very few colours. We were able to remaster it with the help of various software. We also took reference from old photographs where people had posed with certain pages open,” he says.
Every inch of the illustration and design was manually traced, digitally blown up and coloured. “To remaster a page to its original glory took close to a week. Even the handwritten calligraphy had to be traced and then imposed on the digital page to make the words readable. No specific font/style was followed…so, we couldn’t type it digitally. It took over two years and 250-odd pen nibs for the writer to handwrite the original,” he shares.
Vijay, intends to donate a copy to every school library. “We plan to donate a copy to them at a cost. We realised that if we give it for free, people will not care about it, like what had happened to the first 1,000 copies. Limited editions will be printed for ones who are interested in owning a copy. We are doing a lot of activities to get people to understand the democracy that is India.
One of the initiatives that we want to start is debate clubs in government schools because we believe debating is an art that we still have to learn. So, the funds raised from the book’s sale will be used for those activities. The students have already been given a prelude about our constitution…the main aim is to start conversations about how the government works, so that all of us are aware and don’t just end up complaining,” he explains.
Drafting the constitution
It took two years, 11 months and 18 days for the members of the Constituent Assembly to draft the Constitution for independent India, “This book is an outcome of several debates, amendments and over 300 people meeting every week and building a vision for this country. It’s a piece of history, which has a soul to it,” explains Vijay.
Editions
Once the final touch up and vibrancy check is done, Vijay will launch four editions of the book. “One edition will be released by September and a downscaled PDF version of it will be uploaded in our website,” he says.
