My Childhood

1. Where and when Kalam grew up

Kalam begins by telling us that he was born into a middle-class Tamil family in the island town of Rameswaram, which was then in the Madras State. The time was the period of the Second World War, a period of great uncertainty across the world. He describes himself honestly as a short boy with rather ordinary looks, born to tall and handsome parents. From the very first lines we see his trademark humility and honesty — a great man who never pretends to be more than he is. He lived in his ancestral house, which was a fairly large pucca house on the Mosque Street, and his early years were spent in a secure and happy environment.

2. His parents — honesty and generosity

Kalam describes his father, Jainulabdeen, as a man who had neither much formal education nor much wealth, yet possessed great wisdom and a true generosity of spirit. His father avoided all unnecessary comforts and luxuries, but the household always had the necessities of life provided in plenty, with great care and love. His mother, Ashiamma, was an ideal helpmate to his father. Kalam remembers that they fed many outsiders every day, and he is sure that the number of people his mother fed was far more than all the members of her own family put together. From his parents he absorbed the values of honesty, self-discipline, faith and kindness — qualities that shaped his whole life. He inherited honesty and self-discipline from his father, and faith in goodness and deep kindness from his mother.

3. A secure and content childhood

Kalam describes his childhood as secure, both materially and emotionally. He generally ate with his mother, sitting on the kitchen floor, where she would place a banana leaf before him, on which she spread rice and aromatic sambhar, a variety of sharp home-made pickle and a dollop of fresh coconut chutney. Though their needs were simple, the home was full of warmth and contentment. This sense of security and simplicity is an important part of why Kalam grew up to be a balanced, grateful and grounded human being.

4. His three childhood friends and communal harmony

One of the most important parts of the chapter is Kalam’s friendship. He had three close friends in his childhood — Ramanadha Sastry, Aravindan and Sivaprakasan. All three were from orthodox Hindu Brahmin families, while Kalam was a Muslim, yet none of them ever felt any difference among themselves because of their religion or upbringing. Ramanadha Sastry later took charge of the Rameswaram temple, Aravindan went into the business of arranging transport for visiting pilgrims, and Sivaprakasan became a catering contractor for the Southern Railways. This natural, easy friendship across religions is the heart of the chapter’s message of communal harmony.

5. The Shri Sita Rama Kalyanam festival

During the annual Shri Sita Rama Kalyanam ceremony, Kalam’s family used to arrange boats with a special platform for carrying the idols of the deities from the temple to the marriage site, situated in the middle of a pond. Events from the Ramayana and from the life of the Prophet were narrated to the children in the evenings. This shows how the two religious traditions lived together peacefully in his home and town, and how Kalam grew up respecting both.

6. The painful incident in the classroom

A sad and important incident took place when Kalam was in the fifth class, at the age of about eight. A new teacher came to their school. Kalam used to wear a cap that marked him as a Muslim, and he always sat in the front row next to his best friend, Ramanadha Sastry, who wore the sacred thread. The new teacher could not stomach a Hindu priest’s son sitting beside a Muslim boy, and so he ordered Kalam to move to the back bench. Both boys felt very sad. Ramanadha Sastry looked so miserable as Kalam shifted to the last row that the memory stayed with Kalam forever. This was Kalam’s first painful brush with social inequality and the injustice of communal prejudice.

7. How the prejudice was corrected

When the boys told their parents about the incident, the reaction was firm. Ramanadha Sastry’s father, the priest Lakshmana Sastry, summoned the teacher and, in front of Kalam, told him bluntly that he should not spread the poison of social inequality and communal intolerance in the minds of innocent children. He asked the teacher either to apologise or to quit the school and the island. The teacher not only regretted his behaviour but his strong sense of conviction eventually reformed him. This incident teaches that wise and brave elders can stop prejudice from taking root.

8. The science teacher who broke barriers

The second important figure is Kalam’s science teacher, Sivasubramania Iyer, a high-caste Brahmin with a very orthodox wife, yet a man of rebellious and reformist ideas. He wanted to break the barriers of caste. He once invited Kalam to his home for a meal. His wife was so deeply conservative that she refused to serve a Muslim boy in her ritually pure kitchen. Unshaken, the teacher served Kalam with his own hands and sat down beside him to eat. He invited Kalam again the next weekend; this time his wife, who had perhaps observed that nothing “polluting” had happened, took him inside her kitchen and served him food herself. Through this quiet act, the teacher showed how attitudes can be changed by conviction and personal example, not just words.

9. The Second World War and Kalam’s first earnings

When the Second World War broke out, there was a sudden demand for tamarind seeds in the market. Kalam used to collect the seeds and sell them to a provision shop on Mosque Street, earning the princely sum of one anna a day. The war also affected Rameswaram in another way: the train halt at Rameswaram station was suspended, and bundles of newspapers had to be thrown out from the moving train as it passed. Kalam’s cousin Samsuddin, who distributed newspapers in Rameswaram, needed a helping hand to catch the bundles, and Kalam became that helping hand. In this way Kalam earned his first wages, and he recalls the surge of pride he felt at earning his own money. This early experience taught him the dignity and value of honest hard work.

10. Theme analysis — secularism, hard work and self-belief

Communal harmony and secularism: The strongest theme is that religion should never divide human beings. Kalam, a Muslim, had Hindu best friends, lived in harmony with both religious traditions, and saw prejudice defeated by good people. The chapter is a powerful plea for unity in diversity.

Breaking social barriers: Through Lakshmana Sastry and Sivasubramania Iyer, the chapter shows that change comes from courageous individuals who refuse to accept unjust customs and instead set a personal example.

The value of hard work and honesty: From his parents Kalam learned honesty and discipline; from selling tamarind seeds and helping his cousin he learned the dignity of labour and the joy of his first earnings. These early lessons built the great scientist he became.

Simplicity and contentment: A secure, simple childhood, free from greed and full of love, gave Kalam the inner strength to dream big and remain grounded throughout his life.