Book Bearings
Wings of Fire
- 180 pages · about 3 hours
- First published 1999
- 9 editions
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1 About this book
Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam, the son of a little-educated boat-owner in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, had an unparalleled career as a defence scientist, culminating in the highest civilian award of India, the Bharat Ratna.
As chief of the country’s defence research and development programme, Kalam demonstrated the great potential for dynamism and innovation that existed in seemingly moribund research establishments.
This is the story of Kalam’s rise from obscurity and his personal and professional struggles, as well as the story of Agni, Prithvi, Akash, Trishul and Nag—missiles that have become household names in India and that have raised the nation to the level of a missile power of international reckoning. This is also the saga of independent India’s struggle for technological self-sufficiency and defensive autonomy—a story as much about politics, domestic and international, as it is about science.
- Biography
- Presidents
- Scientists
2 What to expect
The autobiography of Abdul Kalam, the Indian aerospace scientist who later became president, written with Arun Tiwari. It moves in order from a modest childhood in Rameswaram, through his years in India's space program, to his leadership of its missile projects. Family, friends and faith have a place beside the rockets, and the book is also an account of India's push for technological self-reliance. It is short, though it goes into detail on individual projects.
3 About A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
Bio adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
4 More by A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
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