Col Ajay Singh is an alumnus of St Xavier’s College, Mumbai where he graduated with Honours in English Literature. He has served in the Indian Army for 28 yearsand in his distinguished careerhas served in every part of the country and overseas.
He has authored five books and over 200 articles. His books are, ‘The Battles that Shaped Indian History’ (Co-authored by Monisha Singh and released in October 2011); ‘A Spectrum of Modern Warfare’, (released May 2013). His third book, ‘Through Orphaned Eyes” (November 2016) is a historical novel that covers the story of India and Pakistan.His fourth book, “On India’s Battlefields”has been hailed as ‘a landmark in Indian military writing’. He appears frequently on television and has co-hosted the television serials‘Rakt Ranjit’ and “PradhanMantri II”for ABP News Channel. In addition, he writes screenplay forfilms, televisionand advertisement films.
He speaks extensively on literature, history, and contemporary events at literary festivals, webinars, corporates, management institutes, schools and colleges and is a guest lecturer in English Literature in St Xavier’s College Mumbai.
‘The Final Draft’ – a collection of twelve short stories - is his fifth book which has received wide critical and literary acclaim.
Ajay Singh is a man of varied talents. A poet, a photographer, a military historian and novelist, he now explores a new genre of writing in his latest offering ‘The Final Draft’ – a collection of twelveshort stories, each interspersed with short, but appropriate verses of poetry.
The title story “The Final Draft” explores a brilliant writer dying of cancer who is obsessed with completing his magnum opus before his death. His wife helps him in what would be the last work of his life and amazingly, they help keep the cancer at bay. The story traces the individual thoughts and journey of the two key characters till the shock ending, which hits like a punch in the solar plexus. Does he complete his work, and what happens when he does?
Each of the twelve stories have their own distinct themes.“The Well’ tells the story of a young school teacher who is brutally raped by a terrorist and now carrying his child. It brings out the stark reality of terrorism in the beautiful valley of Kashmir. There are stories of love lost and found – as we see in ‘The Ring’ in which a beautiful young woman waits for her dead lover near the sea shore where he died. Does he finally arrive? The subject of creativity forms the underlying core of four of the stories, perhaps reflecting the author’s mind. There are stories of war and humanity, of artists and writers, and even a children’s parable, in which a father tells a bedtime story to his daughter to explain how rainbows are formed. He also dwells on the subject of the pandemic in a darkly prophetic vision of a world of the future, which is hit by a mysterious illness, and through the story unravels the complexities of individual freedom and society. The supernatural too surfaces in ‘The Completed Canvas’ in which a young artist meets an old lover in a remote resort – only to find he is not quite what he appeared to be. And the last two stories of this exquisite collection tells of a wronged couple who seek their revenge by carrying out a brilliant art-heist, (which is planned and depicted with a meticulousness that makes it very plausible) and then find themselves thrust in dangerous game of crime and theft.
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