#437 - The Treasure of the Khasi Hills

by Hemendra Kumar Roy and translated by Jashodhara Chakraborti

“The Treasure of the Khasi Hills” by Hemendra Kumar Roy and translated from Bengali by Jashodhara Chakraborti. Published by Talking Cub, the children’s imprint of Speaking Tiger. An enthralling adventure of two friends who find themselves on the trail of a treasure hunt which has dangers lurking at every single step.

Treasure hunts are always exciting. But what if the clues to the location are cryptic. Well, this is what seventeen year old Kumar finds when he stumbles upon a skull engraved with a wild assortment of numbers in his late grandfather’s iron trunk. His mother is aghast and asks him to dispose it off. When his home gets burgled in the night and the thieves have ransacked only the trunk and not touched any other valuables around, ke knows the skull holds secrets. He finds out that it has the encoded directions to an enormous treasure hidden by a king long time ago in a cave in the Khasi hills. It is supposed to be guarded by a Yaksha. A pocketbook belonging to his grandfather reveals that he did not undertake the mission to find the treasure as the path to it was filled with dangers. When he tried to take his neighbour Karalibabu’s help in finding it, he realised that the man was greedy and wanted it all for himself. So he aborted the mission.

Karalibabu however had not given up on his quest for the treasure. It was he who was trying to find the skull and the pocketbook of Kumar’s grandfather. Kumar seeks out the help of his good friend Bimal who is intelligent, trustworthy and well travelled. Kumar himself has never gone outside Calcutta. A cat and mouse chase starts when the friends decide to go looking for the treasure. They however have made up their minds to set out without backing off despite the perils of the quest. They set out with Bimal’s trusted help Ramhari and Kumar’s dog Bagha. Can they find the treasure? Will they be able to get there before Karalibabu and his men? Read the extraordinary adventures of the friends and the escapades that they get into.

The book proved to be just amazing! My nine year old was hooked after we finished the first one or two chapters. He was so curious to know what would happen next and didn’t want to stop reading it. We would have probably read the book in one go if not for school next day. This is proof that this book written almost a century ago still manages to engage the attention of readers. The original story was written in Bengali and titled “Jawkher Dhon”. We couldn’t agree more with the translator’s claim that this is the best adventure book that she had read.

The characters were quite memorable and my son loved Bimal particularly as he was awed by his smartness every single time. Every time the friends got a bit complacent, the villains would be back at the forefront of the adventure and cause some disaster. I liked the fact that the heroes weren’t shown to be invincible. They made mistakes, learned from them, kept going, perked each other up and faced their fears. It was amazing to see the places through Kumar’s eyes. His realisation that we have not learned to value and respect the wealth of our own nation when he saw the flora of the forests while travelling was one of the ways that the author was trying to invoke pride in the youngsters about India at that time.

The book is certainly going to be in our memories for a long time to come and we are hoping that more such translations of Hemen Babu’s stories come out so that we can read them. Overall the book is a “MUST READ” with an amazingly concocted mixture of adventure and mystery with a dash of spookiness.

Recommended Age

The book is apt for children aged 10 and above.

Reasons to Read

This is a 93 year old iconic story appearing for the first time in English that introduces the writing of the man who is credited with creating the genres of horror and adventure for children in modern Bengali fiction.

Disclaimer - We received this book from the publisher, Talking Cub, for review. Thank you to Tanu, from Talking Cub, for sending across the book!