Pishi Caught in a Storm

Authors: Mala Kumar, Manisha Chaudhry

Illustrator: Sangeeta Das

Pishi was feeling sad and lonely. Just a day ago, he was one of a group of manta rays. They were feasting on tonnes of fish, far from the coast of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

How they had splashed and jumped out of the waters of the beautiful Indian Ocean! When he saw a ship ahead, Pishi had taken a huge dive in the water. His friends scattered. Pishi flapped his huge cloak-like fins and tried to swim to safety.

There was a huge streak of lightning and a sound of thunder next. Pishi lost his bearings. The ocean had gone dark for him. A big wave rolled up, pushing him directly under the ship. Aaah, a cut on his belly!

He knew what he had to do. He had to find his friends. But first he needed his wound to be treated. He swam and glided as fast as he could towards the coast.

Pishi’s heart beat fast. He wished he was not so big – 10 metres long, and weighing over 900 kilograms! He had to get to a hospital. Fast! His life depended on it.

Then he saw the lighthouse on the coast. He leapt with joy! Pishi had reached the hospital, nature's hospital.

A huge school of fish swam around him immediately. The same fish that he ate at other times were now his nurses. They cleaned the deep gash in his tummy.

The ‘cleaner fish’ nibbled on the torn pieces of skin. Soon Pishi felt so much better. He loved the Indian Ocean with its 5,000 species of marine life!

Dear Reader,

The Indian Ocean is known as ‘Ratnakara’ in ancient Sanskrit literature. Ratnakara means the mine of jewels.

Manta rays often visit cleaning stations. A cleaning station can be called nature’s hospital in the ocean. Here, small fish such as angelfish swim in the manta ray’s gills and over its skin. They are called cleaner fish because, they clean the manta ray by eating up parasites and dead tissue. Even though manta rays are huge, they are quite gentle.

They are hunted by many animals like big sharks, whales and humans.

#6FrameStoryChallenge: A Carnival of Art

The illustrations in this book were created as part of the #6FrameStoryChallenge, an online campaign run by Pratham Books to build a rich bank of illustrations for StoryWeaver. The essence of the #6FrameStoryChallenge was to tell a good story using just 6 illustrations.

The campaign inspired nearly 70 illustrators to donate their time and skills to India’s first open-source story-publishing platform for children. What started out as an experimental campaign soon blossomed into a carnival of art, birthing nearly 500 new illustrations.

These wordless narratives cut across language barriers, opening up a world of possibilies, encouraging StoryWeaver’s growing community to dream up multiple stories around these images. The #6FrameStoryChallenge is a powerful reminder of the need for collaboration, to get closer to our mission: “A Book in Every Child’s Hand.”

This book was made possible by Pratham Books' StoryWeaver platform. Content under Creative Commons licenses can be downloaded, translated and can even be used to create new stories provided you give appropriate credit, and indicate if changes were made. To know more about this, and the full terms of use and attribution, please visit the following link .

Story Attribution:

This story: Pishi Caught in a Storm is written by Mala Kumar , Manisha Chaudhry . © Pratham Books , 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license.

Other Credits:

This story has been inspired by an entry to the #6FrameStoryChallenge, an illustration campaign conducted by Pratham Books.

Illustration Attributions:

Cover page: Manta Ray in a huge storm , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 2: A sailing ship , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 3: A manta ray , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 4: Manta ray caught in a thunder storm , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 5: A swimming manta ray , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 6: Manta ray making its way to the lighthouse , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 7: A lighthouse , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 8: Manta ray on a sunny day , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 9: Manta ray swimming in the sun , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 10: Manta ray , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 11: collage of #6FrameStoryChallenge illustrations , by Sangeeta Das © Pratham Books, 2015. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Disclaimer: https://www.storyweaver.org.in/terms_and_conditions

Some rights reserved. This book is CC-BY-4.0 licensed. You can copy, modify, distribute and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission. For full terms of use and attribution, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Pishi Caught in a Storm (English)

Pishi was a huge manta ray fish. Once, when he was caught in a big storm in the Indian Ocean, guess who came to his rescue? Dive into this book for a dramatic story.

This is a Level 3 book for children who are ready to read on their own.

Pratham Books goes digital to weave a whole new chapter in the realm of multilingual children's stories. Knitting together children, authors, illustrators and publishers. Folding in teachers, and translators. To create a rich fabric of openly licensed multilingual stories for the children of India and the world. Our unique online platform, StoryWeaver, is a playground where children, parents, teachers and librarians can get creative. Come, start weaving today, and help us get a book in every child's hand!