Handwritten Character Recognition (HCR) remains a fundamental yet challenging problem in pattern recognition due to variations in writing styles, distortions, noise, and inter-class similarity. This study proposes an intelligent AI-based framework for robust handwritten character recognition using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). The model is trained and evaluated on a self-curated dataset comprising 13,640 grayscale images representing 62-character classes, including digits (0–9), lowercase letters (a–z), and uppercase letters (A–Z). Images are standardized to a resolution of 28×28 pixels and normalized to enhance learning efficiency. The proposed CNN architecture leverages hierarchical feature extraction through multiple convolutional and pooling layers, followed by dense layers for classification. Experimental results demonstrate a recognition accuracy of approximately 93%, indicating strong generalization capability despite handwriting variability. The proposed framework emphasizes automated feature learning, eliminating the dependency on handcrafted descriptors traditionally used in character recognition systems. The model exhibits strong adaptability across diverse handwriting patterns, demonstrating robustness to intra-class variations. Furthermore, the lightweight CNN architecture ensures computational efficiency, making the system suitable for real-time applications and deployment in resource-constrained environments. The study also highlights the critical role of dataset quality, preprocessing strategies, and normalization techniques in improving recognition performance. Overall, the findings confirm that deep learning-driven approaches offer a reliable, scalable, and efficient solution for handwritten character recognition.