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Currently the world is facing another economic challenging situation (or we may say that we are on the threshold of economic crisis!?). This is probably the right time to visit the life and journey of the most accomplished economist (having remarkable other abilities of management, administration, ruling, teaching and more) Vishnugupt or Vishnu as his loved ones called him, but better known as Kautilya or Chanakya.
If he have only given us the rules of economics, it was sufficient of him to be in our memories forever. But, he, in addition, tried giving India, a stable kingdom and it is a precious gift by him. He thought of the ill parts of society as a decease and was sure that we must to hill it or remove it so the entire body can live healthy.
There are sure a number of attempts made to visualize his journey and present the same till date, before and after, but the most remarkable, thoughtful and nearest to the reality (based on the immense quality research done by the man behind the project – who also played the protagonist in the TV serial – Dr. ChandraPrakash Dwivedi) is the TV serial – Chanakya. The TV serial was aired on Doordarshan with total 47 episodes from 8 September 1991 to 9 August 1992. The TV serial covered events occurred between between 340 BCE and 321/20 BCE, which in some way affected not only the kingdom of Magadh (or Magadha) – the karmabhoomi of Chanakya – but to entire Republic Of India.
| TV Serial | : | Chanakya |
| Director | : | Chandraprakash Dwivedi |
| Producer | : | Prakash Dwivedi |
| Created By | : | Chandraprakash Dwivedi |
| Written By | : | Chandraprakash Dwivedi |
| Editors | : | Mohan Kaul, Rajeev Khandelwal |
| Location | : | Film City, Mumbai |
| Crew | : | Rajan Kothari (Cinematography), Subhash Agarwal (Audiography), Ashit Desai (Music), Nitish Roy (Art Director), Nitin Chandrakant Desai (Associate Art Director), Salim Arif (Costume Designer), Muneesh Sappel (Assistant Costume Designer) |
| Cast | : | Chandraprakash Dwivedi (Chanakya / Vishnugupt / Kautilya), Mitesh Safari (Young Chanakya), Dinesh Shakul (Chandragupta Maurya), Abhishek Dwivedi (Young Chandragupta), Sanjeev Puri (Sinharan), Deepraj Rana (Akshay), Bakul Thacker (Sharangdev), Sanjay Mishra (Nipunak), Navneet Nishan (Shaunotra), Suraj Chaddha (King Dhanananda), Pramod Moutho (Shaktar), Himanshu Gokani (Vakranas), Surendra Sharma (Shishupal), Vimal Verma (Paur Milind), Ragini Shah (Chanakya’s mother), Ajay Dubey (Acharya Chanak), S.P. Dubey (Acharya Abhinavgupta), Meenakshi Thakur (Bhamini), Mahendra Raghuvanshi (Kaaljayi), Ankur Merchant (Young Ajeya), Punit Shukla (Young Kartikeya), Utkarsha Naik (Chandragupta’s mother), Laxmikant Karpe (Chandragupta’s uncle), Mihir Bhuta (Young Katyayan), Susheel Parashar (Crematorium grounds keeper), Shikha Diwan (Angad’s mother), Surendra Pal (Katyayan / Amatya Rakshas), Irrfan Khan (Bhadrashaal), Ashok Lokhande(Purushdutt), Naresh Suri (Balgupta), Ishan Trivedi (Acharya Ajey), Renuka Israni (Maitree), Manoj Joshi (Shriyak), Vipin Sharma (Varruchi), Chand Dhar (Acharya Rudradev), Trilok Malhotra (Bhagurayan), Jairoop Jeevan (Susidharthak), Salim Arif (Sidharthak), Neena Gupta (Shweta), Prakash Dwivedi (Jeevasiddhi), Sudhir Dalvi (Ambhiraj), Adarsh Gautam (Ambhikumar / Ambhi), Chandramohan Bounthiyal (Anujdev), Brij Mohan Vyas (Kulpati Acharya Taponidhi), Siraj Syed (Sushen), Namrata Sahani (Alka), Arun Bali (Parvateshwar / Poras), Ashok Banthia (Indradutt), Malvika Tiwari (Kalyani),Kirti Azad (Ashtavakra), Kumar Ram Pravesh (Chakravak), Anita Kanwal (Subhada), Kamal Chaturvedi (Mrityunjay), Chandrakant Beloskar (Pishuna), Prakash Dwivedi (Laghu Pauravraj), JD Majithia (Malayketu), Shahrukh Irani (Alakshendra / Alexander the Great), Nileish Malhotra (Xatrap Philip), Kurush Deboo (Cliturcus / Kritorus), And Others… |
There is misconception about Chanakya (for a lot of people) is that whatever he did was his personal revenge to DhanaNand and others. Sure it was one of the reasons, but he was the visionary who had seen the truth that the entire BharatVarsh was divided into the smaller segments, some of them were well not kingdoms too; so it was vulnerable to the several attackers and terrorists from amongst anywhere. There was a point came when he was ready to forget his loss and personal interest and plead DhanNand to get united with others and fight the attackers, for the sake of entire BharatVarsh). His main intentions were to awake the people, make them united, make them ready and have them the better life. He was having the ability to lead. He didn’t fought for his personal gain anytime. Sure he had to be brutal at several times. But, a doctor have to be brutal when operate a patient, to conduct the task and make him healthy again.
The most precious gem of Chanakya was about the educators. He himself was a teacher and believe that a teacher never is a mere employee or person living on other’s mercy anyway. Creation and Destruction are his abilities. He is the one who guides the future generations and hence the entire society.
Everyone needs to watch this TV serial for its authenticated material weaved inside. It is not the journey of Chanakya and/or Chandragupta and their contemporaries only, it may prove a self-awakening for you. The good thing is the stuff is available as a set of 8 DVDs (and a VCD version too), so it can be watched at your own comfort. It will surely prove a good medium to revisit the history and learn from the same for the entire family.
The entire TV Serial is available for view on YouTube. Here you go:
