The Man Who Became Khali by Dalip Singh Rana/Vinit K. Bansal (Book Review-2.5*/5) !!!

Reading biographies about sportsmen really charges you up and makes you motivated towards changing your lifestyle as soon as possible. I have read many autobiographies and biographies of personalities belonging to different professions like politics, manufacturing, sports, movies, film making, entrepreneurship etc. Each time I have read an autobiography, I have felt motivated to do something big with my life and it has changed something in my routine. Even reading Karan Johar’s autobiography did that to me which has nothing related to me. Such books definitely raise the bar about how an autobiography/biography has to be written. I just ended up reading The Great Khali’s autobiography titled as “The Man who became Khali”. The book is co-authored by Vinit K. Bansal who generally writes love stories.

Khali’s life has been very dramatic and knowing his struggles and hurdles that he passed during his childhood years is really painful and inspiring. How he changed his destiny from being a labour to bodybuilder to constable to Mr. Punjab to a wrestler before trying many other sports too. The way he narrates how not being educated made him make fool of his own life at many turning points makes you realize how important education and literacy is. His love for his wife is also evident in the two chapters that is totally dedicated to her. The way he takes tough decisions for his family shows that behind the huge physique there’s a caring and emotional man.

The book is written as a Wikipedia article where you get to know in which year Khali did what. It tells you his journey right from his childhood to the recent years. It tells you about his personality that he gets angry whenever he faces humiliation which makes him do something big and different. The book also tells that Khali takes his own decision and doesn’t listen to anyone even his father. But, there’s a very big problem with this autobiography. Anyone who keeps an autobiography expects to know the minute details about that personality as we are interested in going inside the mind of that person and not through the timeline of events in his life.

Nowhere is it mentioned that what kind of exercises Khali went through. Everyone is interested in knowing Khali’s diet which is never talked about. What did his family feel when he came on the television for the first time is not narrated anywhere. Is WWE rigged or not is never discussed which is the main thing which should have been talked about in the book. How did he manage to learn the little bit of English that he knows is not shared with the readers. How hard, difficult or funny it was to act for movies and advertisements is not described. His fear while fighting with his opponents is never discussed. The book is written with a purpose to just tell what Khali did in each phase of his life but you will never get to know who Khali really is, what he really thinks, what he is passionate about except sports etc. Overall, it is not an impressive autobiography at all. I give it 2.5* out of 5.

Thanks.

ABHILASH RUHELA – VEERU!!!