Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Cyphoidbomb (talk | contribs) at 18:25, 16 April 2020 (Fix link). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Mahabharat
Genre	Mythology
Created by	Siddharth Kumar Tewary
Based on	Mahabharat by Vyasa
Written by	Sharmin Joseph Radhika Anand Anand Vardhan Mihir Bhuta Siddharth Kumar Tewary
Directed by	Siddharth Anand Kumar Amarprith G Mukesh Kumar Singh Kamal Monga Loknath Pandey
Creative director	Amol surve
Starring	Saurabh Raj Jain Shaheer Sheikh Pooja Sharma Aham Sharma Aarav Chowdhary Arpit Ranka Praneet Bhat
Narrated by	Saurabh Raj Jain
Composers	Ajay-Atul Ismail Darbar
Country of origin	India
Original language	Hindi
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	267
Production
Producers	Siddharth Kumar Tewary Gayatri Gil Tewary Rahul Kumar Tewary
Production locations	Umbergaon, Gujarat
Editor	Paresh Shah
Camera setup	multi camera
Production company	Swastik Productions
Original release
Network	StarPlus
Release	16 September 2013 (2013-09-16) – 16 August 2014 (2014-08-16)
Related
Mahabharat (1988)

Mahabharat is an Indian Hindi-language television series based on the ancient Sanskrit epic Mahabharat. It aired from 16 September 2013 to 16 August 2014 on Star Plus. The television show was produced by Swastik Productions Pvt. Ltd starring Saurabh Raj Jain as Shri Krishna, Shaheer Sheikh as Arjun, Pooja Sharma as Draupadi, Aham Sharma as Karna, Arav Chowdhary as Bhishma, Arpit Ranka as Duryodhan.

Plot

The story starts off with King Shantanu of Hastinapur ascending from the kuru clan. He is in love with a fishermen chiefs daughter named Satyavati. He also has a son named Devavrat from his previous marriage to Ganga, who is his successor. Satyavati refuses to marry Shantanu as she thinks that she would have no position in the palace when Devavrat becomes King. Shantanu cuts off ties with Satyavati upon listening to this, but is miserable doing so. Devavrat unable to see his father's misery goes to Satyavati to convince her to marry his father, which he does by taking the oath of life long celibacy. Owing to this vow, he's given the name Bhishma and the boon of iccha mrutyu (death when desired). King Shantanu and Satyavati get married and have two children named Chitrangdha and Vichitraveerya. As time passes King Shantanu dies a natural death and so does Chitrangda due to Gandharvas. Vichitraveerya is next in line to throne but is an alcoholic and incapable of being king. Satyavati orders Bhishma to win the swayamwar of the princesses of Kashi on behalf of Vichitraveerya. Bhishma does so, but the eldest of them- Amba desires another king, and hence is freed. But the king she desires refuses to accept her because she was won by someone else, this results in her demanding Bhishma to marry her and when he refuses to do so she vows revenge on him, which leads to her getting a boon from Lord Shiva to be Bhishmas death in her next birth.

The other two princesses of Kashi- Ambika and Ambaalika are married to Vichitraveerya, but he too dies an untimely death, leaving them childless and the throne of Hastinapur without a successor. Satyavati to solve this problem requests Sage Vyasa to bless the two princesses with children. Vyasa obeys her and blesses the princess along with a maid with children. The eldest princess gives birth to a blind child named Dhritrashtra, the younger one to Pandu and the maid to Vidura. They all grow up under Bhishmas guidance. When Dhritrashtra is to be crowned king, Bhishma goes to Gandhar to ask for Gandhari's hand in marriage to Dhritrashtra as she had a boon from Lord Shiva to be blessed by a 100 sons. The proposal is acceptable as Gandhari will get to be queen. Also Gandhari covers her eyes with a cloth to accompany her husband by not seeing the world. On the day of the crowning ceremony it's established by Vidura, as the minister of the kingdom, that Dhristrashtra is unfit to be king and hence Pandu, next in line, is crowned king. Shakuni, the elder brother of Gandhari, now feels that his sister has been decived and her life has been spoilt.

King Pandu in seek of a wife arrives at Kuntibhoj, wins the swayamvar and marries princess Kunti. Later as a result of winning a war, princess Madri of Madra kingdom's hand is also given to him in marriage. Due to killing of a Sage on a hunt Pandu is cursed that he will die if he gets intimate with his wives. To repent his wrong doing he along with his wives goes to the forest. Here Kunti reveals to him that when she was young princess she had got a boon from Sage Durvasa to obtain children from any God she wishes with the help of a holy chant. With this, the couple obtains three children- Yudhishtira from Yama, Bheema from Vayu, Arjuna from Indra. Madri also uses the chant to obtain twins- Nakula and Sahadeva from the Ashwini Kumars, together the five were called Pandavas. Parallely in Hastinapur Dhritrashtra is king and Gandhari gives birth to 100 sons, Duryodhana being the first born, and a daughter, they're collectively called the Kauravas. The Pandavas along with their parents grow up in the forest until Pandu gets killed as a effect of the curse and Madri sacrifices herself on his pyer. Thus Kunti along with the children returns to Hastinapur.

The Pandavas and Kauravas together grow up and are educated in Vedas, Shastras and warfare under Guru Drona. After the completion of their education Drona asks for gurudakshina in the form of defeating King Drupad and conquering his kingdom. The Pandavas successfully achieve this feat following which Yudhishtira, being the eldest, becomes crown prince. This is not acceptable by Duryodhana who wishes to be king himself, so plotting with Shakuni he sends the Pandavas along with Kunti to a wax palace in Varanavrat where he plans on burning them to death. The Pandavas become aware of this plan and escape the palace, but go into hiding so that nobody finds out they're alive and tries to cause more harm. Elsewhere Drupad being defeated by Dronas pupils prays for a son who can avenge this insult and kill Drona by performing a sacrifice. He gets blessed with such a son- Drishtadhyuma and also a daughter- Draupadi, both of whom emerge from the sacrificial fire. Drupad conducts a swayamvar for Draupadi in which Arjuna, in the disguise of a Brahmin, takes part. He wins the swayamvar which consisted of shooting a arrow to the eye of a fish by looking at its reflection in a bowl of oil kept below. Pandavas along with Draupadi approach Kunti to inform her of the new bride who tells them to divide whatever they've got between themselves thinking that they were talking about alms. Due to this instruction of Kunti all the five of them married Draupadi and the news of them being alive reached Hastinapur to where they were summoned to.

Here arised the problem as Duryodhana had been declared next in line to throne thinking that Yudhishtira was dead, but with the Pandavas being alive everything changed. To solve this issue the kingdom was divided into half with Khandavprast, a waste forest land, being given to the Pandavas to rule over. The Pandavas successfully utilised the land and made it into a prosperous kingdom, additionally they acquired the acceptance of all Kings of Yudhishtira as the Emperor. To establish this they performed Rajasuyayagna where Duryodhana was invited too, witnessing which he grew extremely jealous of the Pandavas and their kingdom. He along with Shakuni hatched a plan to invite the Pandavas to a game to dice and trick them into gambling away their kingdom and themselves. He was successful in doing so and took it a step too far by trying to disrobe Draupadi in the midst of the whole court (but she was saved by Lord Krishna) and banishing them all from the kingdom for 12 years of forest living and an year of living in disguise.

After 13 years when the Pandavas returned Duryodhana refused to give them back their kingdom. With respect to this and to avenge the insult of Draupadi broke out a war between the Pandavas and Kauravas along with their allies. This was is called the battle of Kurukshetra wherein lies the Hindu holyscripture of Bhagvadgeetha as a conversation between Arjuna and Krishna when the former was not willing to fight against his own kith and kin. The battle was fought with eleven akshauhini's on behalf of the Kauravas and seven akshauhini's from the Pandava's side for a period of eighteen days, at the end of which the Pandavas emerged victorious, with them and Krishna as the only ones alive. After the battle the Pandavas ruled for 36 years and later headed towards heaven after appointing Parikshit, the grandson of Arjuna, as their successor.

Cast

Main

Recurring

Production and development

Star spent ₹5.1 billion (US$60 million) on the project and spent another ₹410 million (US$4.8 million) on marketing the show, making it India's most expensive TV series.

The sets of the series at Umbergaon in Gujarat cost ₹100 crores.

According to producer Siddharth Kumar Tewary, the Draupadi cheer haran (disrobing) sequence, which Tewary himself directed, took 20 days to shoot.

Reception and impact

Critics

Writing for Rediff, Nishi Tiwari wrote that "If it maintains the quality of writing and able actors who portray key characters, we may have another winner among us". DNA praised the costumes, scenery, Krishna's flute theme which was given by Raj Mohan Sinha, and most of the CGI special effects, but said the story pace was too fast.

Viewership

Its premiere had a viewership of approximately 8.4 million people. The show has become the highest rated weekday mythological epic show in the last three years on Indian television. The viewership ratings of the week of 1 December 2013 reached 9,801 TVTs. The game of dice leading to Draupadi's 'cheer haran' took Mahabharat at its peak viewership(10TVTs.4 TVM) and helped the broadcasting channel Star Plus clock the highest GTVMs ever achieved by any channel in Indian Television History.

Other countries

In Indonesia, the drama was broadcast on antv dubbed in Indonesian in March 2014. The casts of Mahabharat were invited to hold a fan meeting tour at Jakarta and Bali. The Times of India reported in 2014 that the show has a huge fan following abroad and as result, the prominent characters from the show had been called to Indonesia for a special event. The main casts of Mahabharat, performed on "Mahabharat Show: Fan Meeting Tour" in the year 2014 . As from 6 December 2015, the show starts airing in its original version and subtitled in English on MBC Digital 4 every Sunday in Mauritius. In Thailand, the drama was broadcast on Channel 5 dubbed in Thai starting 2 January 2016. In Myanmar,it has been dubbed in Burma as မဟာဘာရတ and telecasted Everyday at 8:30 pm on Sky Net World Drama Channel.

Awards and nominations

It won the trophy for the Best Drama in Star Guild Awards 2013 as well as number of accolades in other award shows. Show won Best Historical/Mythological serial award in Indian Television Academy Awards. It won the Indian Telly Awards for Actor in a Supporting Role (Drama), given to Aham Sharma for his portrayal as Karna, and Actor in a Negative Role to Praneet Bhat in 2014. The crew members also won the awards for Best Costumes for a TV Programme, Best Make – Up Artist, and Best Stylist. It has been dubbed to other languages including Bengali, Marathi, Oriya, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu.

References

1. ^ "Mahabharat Episodes". www.hotstar.com. Retrieved 17 November 2018.
2. "Parmavatar Shri Krishna to premiere soon; 5 mythological shows that redefined the genre and left us asking for more". India Today. 5 June 2017. Retrieved 7 April 2018.
3. TNN 1 (15 September 2013). "Mahabharat launced for the youth of the nation! - Times Of India". Articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com. Retrieved 20 October 2013.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
4. "Shakuni's role in Mahabharat once in a lifetime: Praneet Bhatt". The Times of India. Retrieved 9 May 2016.
5. "Is Shafaq Naaz miffed with Mahabharat makers?". The Times of India. Retrieved 9 May 2016.
6. "Shaheer Sheikh and Rohit Bhardwaj's Buddy Diwali!". The Times of India. Retrieved 9 May 2016.
7. "Riding high on 'Mahabharat' ratings, Star Plus tops the chart". Retrieved 9 May 2016.
8. Ajita Shashidhar. "Broadcasters betting big money on the small screen with Rs. 100 crore shows". India Today. Retrieved 12 September 2013.
9. "Bigg Boss, Yudh: TV shows with bumper budgets". The Times of India.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
10. "The cheer haran sequence in Mahabharat took 20 days to shoot". The Indian Express. 4 April 2014. Retrieved 9 May 2016.
11. Kanabar, Ankita R. (2 April 2014). "The cheer haran sequence in Mahabharat took 20 days to shoot". Indian Express. Retrieved 10 April 2014.
12. Nishi Tiwari. "Review: Mahabharat, so far so good". Rediff. Retrieved 17 September 2013.
13. "A young boy from Bihar".
14. Chaya Unnikrishnan (28 September 2013). "Show review: 'Mahabharat'". DNA. Retrieved 28 September 2013.
15. Debashish Mukerji. "Riding high on 'Mahabharat' ratings, Star Plus tops the chart". India Today. Retrieved 27 September 2013.
16. Priyanka Srivastava. "Major networks in epic ratings battle as shows like Mahabharat take on reality TV for nation's viewers". Dailymail.co.uk. Retrieved 26 September 2013.
17. "Rise in the ratings of TV shows this week - Times Of India". Articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com. 1 December 2013. Retrieved 25 January 2014.
18. "Indonesia calling for Mahabharat!". No. 8 December 2014. Times of India. Times of India. Retrieved 4 February 2015.
19. "Mahabharat's Shaheer Sheikh, Aham Sharma & Rohit Bhardwaj woo their fans in Indonesia!". Pink Villa. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
20. "Look what 'Mahabharat' Stars are busy doing in Indonesia!". Pink Villa. Retrieved 1 October 2014.
21. "In Pics: Team 'Mahabharat' works hard in Jakarta and parties harder in Bali!". Pink Villa. Retrieved 8 October 2014.
22. "Casts of Mahabharat will be performing using English, Hindi and Indonesian Languages". tribunnews. 2 October 2014.
23. "Mahabharat Show". tribunnews. 3 October 2014.
24. "Stars of Mahabharat will perform at Jakarta". tribunnews. 1 October 2014.
25. "Residents of Bali bought tickets for Fans Meeting of the casts of Mahabharat". tribunnews. 4 October 2014.
26. "ซีรีย์อินเดีย มหาภารตะ". Channel 5 (in Thai). 2 January 2016. Retrieved 11 May 2016.
27. "Reality shows see a drop in ratings this week - Times Of India". Articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com. 8 December 2013. Retrieved 22 August 2015.
28. "13th Indian Telly Awards: Complete List of Winners". Times of India. 18 October 2014.
29. Janani Karthik (6 December 2014). "Mahabharatham is back on Vijay TV - The Times of India". Indian Express. Retrieved 22 March 2015.

External links

• Mahabharat at IMDb
• Official Website on Hotstar

• Star Plus television series
• Indian mythological television series
• 2013 Indian television series debuts
• 2014 Indian television series endings
• Television series based on Mahabharata
• Television programs based on poems
• 2010s Indian television series
• Star Utsav