Amar Chitra Katha

Supercbbox| title = Amar Chitra Katha
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publisher = India Book House
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issues = 10001
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writers = Various
artists = Various
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creators = Anant Pai

Amar Chitra Katha (Indic|lang=hi|indic=अमर चित्र कथा|trans=amar citra kathā, "Immortal Captivating (or Picture) Stories") is one of India's largest selling comic book series, with more than 90 million copies sold in 20 Indian languages. [cite news
url = http://www.ibnlive.com/news/amar-chitra-katha-tinkle-to-entertain-kids-on-net/57468-11.html
title = Amar Chitra Katha, Tinkle to entertain kids on Net
publisher = CNN-IBN
date = 2008-01-27
accessdate = 2008-01-28] Founded in 1967, the imprint has more than 400 titles that retell stories from the great Indian epics, mythology, history, folklore, and fables in a comic book format. It was created by Anant Pai, and published by India Book House. In 2007, the imprint and all its titles were acquired by a new venture called ACK Media. On September 17, 2008, a new website by ACK-media was launched called www.amarchitrakatha.com [cite news
url = http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2007/11/22/stories/2007112250170500.htm
title = ACK Media buys Amar Chitra Katha, Tinkle brands
publisher = The Hindu Business Line
date = 2007-11-22
accessdate = 2008-01-28]

Creation and Creators

The comic series was started by Anant Pai in an attempt to teach Indian children about their cultural heritage. He was shocked that Indian students could answer questions on Greek and Roman mythology, but not on Indian. Writers like Kamala Chandrakant, Margie Sastry, Subba Rao, Debrani Mitra and C.R Sharma joined the creative team of Amar Chitra Katha, with Anant Pai taking on the role of editor and co-writer on most scripts. The notable illustrators, other than Ram Waeerkar, were Dilip Kadam, Sanjeev Waeerkar, Souren Roy, C.D Rane, Geoffrey Fowler and Pratap Mullick.

The Comics

The original printings of Amar Chitra were not in full colour—because of budgetary constraints, the panels were printed using yellow, blue and green. Subsequent issues, however, changed to full colour. All Amar Chitra Katha books stuck to a monthly (later fortnightly) 30-page format, with emphasis on lucid, entertaining storylines. In addition to the 'singles' format the stories are also available as hardcover 3-in-1 and 5-in-1 bundles. There are special editions of the Epics like the Mahabharata" which is available in a 3 volume 1300+ pages set.

Occasionally there were "bumper" issues with 90 pages, most collecting stories of a similar type from individual issues( Example: "Monkey Stories From The Hitopadesha", "Tales of Birbal") and some being longer stories ( Example: "Jesus Christ", "The Story of Rama"). As the epic stories became more popular, the team began to publish stories based on Indian history, of men and women belonging to different regions and religions and also on stories based on Sanskrit as well as regional classics. The continuous popularity of the comics led to reprints being issued frequently, which ensured that the back-issues remained in print throughout the seventies and the eighties. At the height of its popularity, in the mid-eighties, it had been translated into Bengali, Marathi, Assamese, Gujarati, Punjabi, Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit and Urdu and selling half a million copies a month. Some titles were also translated into French, Spanish, German, Swahili, Fijian, Indonesian, and Serbo-Croat.

Towards the mid-nineties, the original comics were reprinted in sleeker and more durable editions, with thick cardstock covers and better colour separations. Today, Amar Chitra Katha has a national footprint across all major book retailers, hundreds of small bookstores, and tens of thousands of vendors. It is the best-selling children's publication in most large format stores.

In 2007, the publisher created a new online store that offers all the titles with shipping worldwide. The titles are divided in following categories

#Fables & Folktales (e.g. "Panchatantra")
#History (e.g. "Akbar")
#Mythology (e.g. "The Ramayana")
#The Epics (e.g. "The Ramayana")
#Humour & wit
#Biographies (e.g. "Mahatma Gandhi")
#Literary Classics
#3 in 1 Titles
#5 in 1 Titles
#Special Issues

Cultural Significance

Amar Chitra Katha was launched at a time when Indian society was slowly moving away from the traditional joint family system, because of (among other things) socio-economic constraints and urbanization. In a joint family system, grandparents would regale the children of the household with tales from folklore and the epics, and the Amar Chitra Katha series served to fill the void left by grandparents in the smaller nuclear families in urban areas. The choice of English as the primary language led it to reach the majority of children who studied in English medium schools.

Later, when the comic added historical topics, it proved very helpful to students. For most, Indian history, a jumble of names and dates, came alive as stories. The detailed research of architecture, costumes, regional flavours and facts ensured that the comics were widely accepted into the mainstream, both parents and teachers using them as educational aids. To an extent, these books, with their homogenized and unbiased character descriptions went a long way in promoting national integration and increasing inter-provincial awareness throughout the country.

It should be mentioned that the series steered clear of controversy, taming down content and violence and adhering to strict self-censorship.

Criticism

The stories are often simplistic, excessively Indophillic, and sometimes rely on authentic but singular sources for the script. This has led to the criticism that they should not be considered as "history".The illustrations in Amar Chitra Katha created a generation of Indians who could visualize historical and mytholigical characters only through these. These were often not very thoroughly researched and true picturisations, but were later emulated in TV series like 'Mahabharata' and 'Ramayana'. A lot of these were derivatives of artist Raja Ravi Varma's paintings and depictions. The simplistic potrayal of charaters as villains and heroes [much like the way mainstream Hindi movies do] betrayed an association with certain racial and casteist characteristics. For example: All demons were portrayed as dark complexioned, curly haired and noses that were not aquiline.

amarchitrakatha.com

Keeping in tune with the changing times, Amar Chitra Katha has launched their website www.amarchitrakatha.com. Predictably, it has a shop where one can order the comics online but there are other novel features too. They have put up digital versions of the comics that can be read online. Currently, they are available in regional languages such as Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, Gujarati, Bengali, Marathi etc.

Other features such as Create your art and Create your Story allows readers to submit their own art which can become the new editions of the comic. Section such as Culture Beat updates about the cultural events happening all over India. They also plan to add an encyclopedia on India called "ACKpedia".

Further reading

* "The Classic Popular: Amar Chitra Katha (1957-2007)", by Nandini Chandra, Yoda Press, 2008. ISBN 81-903634-3-3.

References

[3.http://www.watblog.com/2008/09/17/review-amarchitrakathacom/]

[4.http://www.medianama.com/2008/09/223-ack-media-launches-amarchitrakathacom/]

External links

* [http://www.amarchitrakatha.com/ The official Amar Chitra Katha website]
* [http://www.ack-media.com/ The official Amar Chitra Katha Media Pvt. Ltd. site]