Chandrakanta (novel)

Chandrakanta
Author(s)	Devaki Nandan Khatri
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Genre(s)	Fantasy novel
Publisher	Lehri Book Depot, Varanasi, India

Chandrakanta is a popular Hindi novel by Devaki Nandan Khatri. It is considered to be the first work of prose in the modern Hindi language, and may have significantly contributed to the language's popularity. The copyright on the novel expired in 1964 and it is now in public domain, along with other titles by the author.

Story

The story is a romantic fantasy about two lovers who belong to rival kingdoms: the princess Chandrakanta of Vijaygarh, and the prince Virendra Singh of Naugarh. Krur Singh, a member of the Vijaygarh king's court who dreams of marrying Chandrakanta and taking over the throne. When Krur Singh fails in his endeavor, he flees the kingdom and befriends Shivdutt, the powerful neighboring king of Chunargarh (a re-naming of "Chunar-fort", referring to the fort in Chunar that inspired Khatri to write the novel). Krur Singh coaxes Shivdutt to ensnare Chandrakanta at any cost. Shivdutt captures Chandrkanta and while running away from Shivdutt , Chandrakanta finds herself as a prisoner in a tilism. After that Kunvar Virendra Singh breaks the tilism and fights with Shivdutt with the help of aiyyars . Chandrakanta, the novel, has many sequels, prominent being a 7-book series (Chandrakanta santati) dealing with the adventure of Chandrakanta and Virendra Singh's children in another major tilism. The locations mentioned in the book are based on actual locations in the district Mirzapur, in current day Uttar Pradesh and Gaya,Rohtas districts in Bihar. Original Novel is very much different from the TV serial "Chandrakanta" made by Neerja Guleri.

Tilism and Aiyyars

Chandrakanta is notable for introducing the concepts of "Aiyyar" and "Tilism" to Hindi literature.

An Aiyyar (male) or Aiyyara (female) is a spy, in the service of a king, who specializes in making disguises and few magic spells with the help of magic potions and elixirs. The Aiyyar can make his face resemble any person, or sometimes an animal, using special makeup. He generally captures a target and imprisons him, then impersonates the prisoner while furthering his or the king's own cause.

A Tilism is a kind of maze containing many secret locations, passages and prisons. It is intended to be "broken", or deciphered, by a person; once broken, all its doors are opened and all its prisoners are released. The person who successfully breaks the Tilism also gains the immense treasures hidden within it.

The novel depicts a number of friendly and unfriendly Aiyyar.

Aiyyars on the side of Virendrasingh include:

• Tej Singh
• Jeet Singh (Tej Singh's father)
• Devi Singh;

Aiyyars on the side of Chandrakanta:

• Chapla
• Champa

Aiyyars on the side of Krur singh:

• Nazim
• Ahmed

Aiyyars on the side of Shivdutt:

• Badrinath
• Chunnilal
• Pandit Jagannath
• Pannalal
• Ramnarayan
• Ghasita Singh

Later on in Chandrakanta Santati, many more Aiyyars were introduced, including:

• Bhootnath
• Bhairo Singh
• Tara singh
• Indra Dev
• Sher Singh

Publication Variants

Chandrakanta comprises a single volume, whereas its sequel Chandrakanta Santiti comprises six volumes and Bhootnath comprises in total seven volumes.

Since the Copyright of the book has been expired a long ago, several different publishers published it on their own. Some of the cheap quality variants are published by Diamond Pocket Books, AH Wheeler & Company etc. However reputed publishers in the field of Hindi Literature such as Rajkamal Paperbacks also published this novel and its sequel in cheap rates. This book is also available in Free E-book format because of its nature of being released in public domain.

Adaptations

Chandrakanta was made into a television serial in the mid-1990s, but the serial was never completed due to financial reasons. However, the only congruence between the novel and the teleserial was in the name of a few characters, the rest of the storyline being completely different from the book. The teleserial also introduced many new characters and both these deviations were not popular with viewers. The teleserial took far too many liberties with the original script and failed to attract wide viewership.

A new serial named Kahani Chandrakanta Ki has been started in 2011 on Sahara One TV Channel ,Based on his next novel in Chandrakanta series named Chandrakanta Santati (story about achandrakanta's sons) by the same director Sunil Agnihotri , with same degree of deviations from the original devki nandan khatri novel.

Indian filmmaker Vidhu Vinod Chopra is producing a film adaptation of the book, which will be directed by Ram Madhvani. The film has been titled Taalismaan and includes Amitabh Bachchan among the cast, playing an Aiyyar.

Abhishek Bachchan will also be seen in this screen adaption of the tale of Chandrakanta. Starring in lead roles, both Amitabh and Abhishek have reportedly suggested Aishwarya Rai Bachchan's name to producers in a bid to bag her the role of Chandrakanta. However, Vidhu Vinod Chopra has refused to cast Aishwarya in this role as he feels she has already portrayed the role of a princess in Ashutoush Gowarikar's Jodhaa Akbar, and he wishes to give someone else a chance.

External links

Online Text

• Chandrakanta at the Digital Library of India