Chanakya (TV series)

Chanakya (Devanagari: चाणक्य) is a 47-part epic Indian television historical drama written and directed by Dr. Chandraprakash Dwivedi that was originally telecast on DD National from 8 September 1991 to 9 August 1992. Produced by Prakash Dwivedi, the series is a fictionalized account of the life and times of 4th century BCE Indian economist, strategist and political theorist Chanakya (also known as Vishnugupta) and is based on events occurring between 340 BCE and 321/20 BCE, starting with Chanakya's boyhood and culminating in the coronation of Chandragupta Maurya. Chandraprakash Dwivedi played the title role of Chanakya.

Quotes about Chanakya

• I am not interested in the present; my idea is to delve into the past and link it with the present. After a great deal of thinking I discovered that politics is the crux of all sciences, just as Chanakya said.... Today the question of national consciousness is agitating the minds of our countrymen. Was it not Chanakya who defined Rashtra and paved the way for the first one?
  • Chandraprakash Dwivedi . "And Now Chanakya". Surya India. A. Anand. 14: 58. 1989.[1]

• In the Chanakya TV-serial, broadcast in truncated version on Doordarshan in 1992, the Hara Hara Mahadev sequences were censored out for fear that they might arouse communal passions.
  • Elst, Koenraad (1999). Update on the Aryan invasion debate New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

• Shiva also continues Indra’s role of warrior-god. Till today, many Shiva sadhus are proficient in the martial arts. ‘The Shaiva war-cry Hara Hara Mabadeva is still used by some regiments of the Indian army. It is a very effective battlefield mantra instilling fear in the enemies of Hinduism, as was clear from the secularists’ demand to cut out the Hara Hara Mahadeva sequences from the Chanakya TV-serial (broadcast in truncated version on Door-darshan in 1992).
  • Indigenous Indians, Elst K. , 1993:41