Bharat Ek Khoj

Bharat Ek Khoj is a 53-episode Indian historical drama based on the book The Discovery of India (1946) by Jawaharlal Nehru[3] that covers a 5,000-year history of India from its beginnings to independence from the British in 1947. The drama was directed, written and produced by Shyam Benegal with cinematographer V. K. Murthy in 1988 for state-owned Doordarshan. Shama Zaidi co-wrote the script.[4] Its cast included Om Puri, Roshan Seth, Tom Alter and Sadashiv Amrapurkar. Jawaharlal Nehru was portrayed by Roshan Seth, the same role he portrayed in the Oscar-winning film Gandhi.[5]

Bharat Ek Khoj
Bharat Ek Khoj DVD cover
Genre	Historical fiction
Created by	Shyam Benegal
Based on	The Discovery of India by Jawaharlal Nehru
Written by	Shyam Benegal Shama Zaidi Sunil Shanbag Vasant Dev (dialogues)
Starring	Roshan Seth Om Puri Tom Alter Sadashiv Amrapurkar Naseeruddin Shah Lucky Ali Seema Kelkar Mita Vashisht Pallavi Joshi Anjan Srivastav Sohaila Kapur Ila Arun Irrfan Khan Ravi Jhankal Piyush Mishra Kulbhushan Kharbanda Subrat Bose, Pankaj Berry
Narrated by	Om Puri[1]
Opening theme	Vanraj Bhatia
Country of origin	India
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	53
Production
Executive producer(s)	Raj Pius
Cinematography	V. K. Murthy
Editor(s)	Bela Bhansali Sanjay Leela Bhansali Dilip Panda Chakradhar Sahu Ashok Swami [2]
Production company(s)	Doordarshan Sahyadri Films
Release
Original network	DD National
Original release	13 November 1988 (1988-11-13)[1]

Production designer Nitish Roy with assistants Samir Chanda and Nitin Desai built 144 sets.[6]

Cast and episode list

Episode	Title	Cast	Role	Notes
1	Bharat Mata Ki Jai[7]	Roshan Seth	Jawaharlal Nehru[1]
2	The Beginnings (Indus Valley Civilization)	Harish Patel, Lalit Mohan Tiwari, Pallavi Joshi	Draha, Shulgi, Atri
3	The Arrival of the Vedic People (the Rigveda)	Anang Desai, K K Raina, Ravi Jhankal	Sardar, Suteja, Bajbandha
4	Caste Formation	Anang Desai, Salim Ghouse, K K Raina, Lalit Mohan Tiwari, Inayatullah Kantroo, Anuradha Tarafdar, Ila Arun	Chandraprabha, Rama, Narada, Arjuna, Dhanpal,Dhanvati, Sheelvati	Story of Shambuka from Ramayana and Ekalavya from Mahabharata were also part of this episode.
5	Mahabharata Part 1	Teejan Bai, Salim Ghouse, Om Puri, Sujata Mehta	Herself, Krishna, Duryodhana, Draupadi
6	Mahabharata Part 2	Om Puri, Pankaj Berry, Ila Arun, Salim Ghouse	Duryodhan, Aswatthama, Gandhari, Krishna
7	Ramayana Part 1[1]	Pallavi Joshi, Salim Ghouse, Pankaj Berry, Ravi Jhankal	Sita, Rama, Bharata, Lakshmana
8	Ramayana Part 2	Om Puri, Pallavi Joshi, Salim Ghouse[1]	Ravana, Sita, Rama
9	Republics and Kingdoms	Virendra Saxena, K K Raina	Mahaanaman, Virudhaka
10	Negation and Acceptance of Life	Dhruv Ghanekar, Aanjjan Srivastav, Om Puri	Nachiketa, Yamaraja, Angulimaal
11	Chanakya and Chandragupta Part 1	Satyadev Dubey, Ravi Jhankal, Mita Vashisht	Chanakya, Chanragupta, Suhasini
12	Chanakya and Chandragupta Part 2	Satyadev Dubey, Ravi Jhankal, Aanjjan Srivastav	Chanakya, Chanragupta, Dhana Nanda
13	Ashoka Part 1	Om Puri, K.K Raina, Ila Arun	Ashoka, Radhagupta, Asandhimitra
14	Ashoka Part 2	Om Puri, K.K Raina, Ila Arun, Lucky Ali (credites as Maqsoom Ali)	Ashoka, Radhagupta, Asandhimitra, Prince Tissa
15	The Sangam Period: Silapaddirakam Part 1	Pallavi Joshi, Rakesh Dhar	Kannaki, Kovalan
16	The Sangam Period: Silapaddirakam Part 2	Pallavi Joshi, Rakesh Dhar, Sulabha Deshpande, Virendra Saxena	Kannaki, Kovalan, Kavundi, Pandit
17	The Classical Age	Anjan Srivastav, Harish Patel, Aparjita Krishna	Sansthanaka, Nai, Vasantsena
18	Kalidas and Shakuntala Part 1	Ravi Jhankal, Pallavi Joshi, Virendra Saxena	Kalidas, Mallika, Matul	Excerpts from plays Ashadh Ka Ek Din by Mohan Rakesh and Shakuntala (play) by Kalidasa were used in this episode.
19	Kālidāsa and Shakuntala Part 2	Ravi Jhankal, Pallavi Joshi, Virendra Saxena	Kalidas, Mallika, Matul
20	Harshavardhana	Pankaj Berry, K Makhija, Aparajita	Harshavardhana, Prabhakar Vardhana, Queen
21	Bhakti	Vijay Kashyap, Rajesh Vivek, Mita Vashisht, Harish Patel	Mahendravarman I, Kapalin, Devasoma, Buddhist Monk
22	The Chola Empire Part 1	Om Puri, Devendre Malhotra, Sunila Pradhan, Shantanu Chaparia	Raja Raja Chola, Ishanashiva, Mahadevi, Tirumala
23	The Chola Empire Part 2	Om Puri, Devendre Malhotra, Sunila Pradhan, Shantanu Chaparia	Raja Raja Chola, Ishanashiva, Mahadevi, Tirumala
24	The Delhi Sultanate Part 1:The Arrival of Turk-Afghans and Prithviraj Raso	K.K. Raina,Vijay Kashyap, Ravi Jhankal, Ahmed Khan	Muhammad Ghori, Chand Bardai, Prithviraj Chauhan, Mahmud Ghazni
25	The Delhi Sultanate Part 2: Prithviraj Raso and Alauddin Khilji	K.K. Raina,Vijay Kashyap, Ravi Jhankal, Achyut Potdar, Om Puri, Rajendra Gupta, Seema Kelkar	Muhammad Ghori, Chand Bardai, Makwana, Alauddin Khilji, Ratan Singh, Padmavati
26	The Delhi Sultanate Part 3: Padmavat and Tughlaq dynasty[8]	Om Puri, Rajendra Gupta, Seema Kelkar,	Alauddin Khalji,Ratan Singh, Padmavati
27	Synthesis	Pankaj Berry	Lorik
28	The Vijayanagar Empire	Om Puri, Salim Ghouse, Anjan Srivastava, Fr. Tasso	Krishna Deva Raya, Aliya Rama Raya, Appaji, Domingo Paes
29	Feudalism[9]	Salim Ghouse, Ila Arun, Pallivi Joshi, Siraj Khan, Ajay Kumar	Aliya Rama Raya, Heggaditi, Mallige, Saguna, Achyuta Deva Raya
30	The Fall of the Vijayanagar Empire	Salim Ghouse, Anang Desai, Pankaj Berry, Ahmed Khan, Arjun Raina	Aliya Rama Raya, Effendi Aslam Bain, Ibrahim Quli Qutb Shah Wali, Hussain Nizam Shah I, Ali Adil Shah I
31	Rana Sanga, Ibrahim Lodi and Babur	Ravi Jhankal, Anang Desai, Lalit Tiwari	Rana Sanga, Ibrahim Lodi, Babur
32	Akbar Part 1 (Din-e Ilahi)	Kulbhushan Kharbanda	Akbar
33	Akbar Part 2	Kulbhushan Kharbanda	Akbar
34	Golden Hind	Ajit Vachhani
35	Aurangzeb Part 1	Om Puri	Aurangzeb
36	Aurangzeb Part 2	Om Puri	Aurangzeb
37	Shivaji Part 1	Naseeruddin Shah[10]	Shivaji
38	Shivaji Part 2	Naseeruddin Shah	Shivaji
39	Company Bahadur (East India Company)	Amrish Puri, Rajendra, Jalal Agha, Tom Alter, Vishal Singh
40	Tipu Sultan	Salim Ghouse	Tipu Sultan
41	The Bengal Renaissance and Raja Ram Mohan Roy	Anang Desai	Raja Ram Mohan Roy
42	1857 Part 1	Tom Alter, Om Puri, Ravi Jhankal
43	1857 Part 2	Tom Alter	British Officer
44	Indigo Revolt	Virendra Saxena	Madhav
45	Mahatma Phule	Sadashiv Amrapurkar	Mahatma Phule
46	Sir Syed Ahmed Khan
47	Vivekananda	Alok Nath	Swami Vivekananda
48	Extremists and Moderates	Mohan Gokhale	Gopal Krishna Gokhale
49	And Gandhi Came Part 1
50	And Gandhi Came Part 2
51	Separatism
52	Do or Die
53	Epilogue

Broadcast

The 53 episodes series was launched in November 1988 which coincide with the birth centenary of Nehru.[1] The series was re-telecast on DD Bharati from 27 May 2013 on the occasion of 49th death anniversary of Jawaharlal Nehru.[11]

See also

• Pradhanmantri
• Bharatvarsh (TV series)
• List of television shows based on Indian history
• List of Indian TV shows with Muslim characters

References

1. Jain, Madhu (20 November 2013). "Bharat Ek Khoj: The making of most extravagant serial ever". India Today.
2. "Shyam Benegal on watching Padmaavat: I want to see what all the fuss is about". Mumbai Mirror.
3. "What makes Shyam special..." The Hindu. 17 January 2003. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
4. "Music in her lines Makeup artist Vivek Nayak". The Hindu. 1 October 2011. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
5. "Roshan Seth waits for right role". The Hindu. 19 November 2001. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
6. "Samir Chanda's death was devastating: Shyam Benegal". The Times of India. 20 August 2011. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
7. Staff, Scroll. "In this first episode of 'Bharat Ek Khoj', Nehru's character quizzes those chanting 'Bharat Mata ki jai' on what the phrase means". Scroll.in.
8. "Om Puri had played Alauddin Khilji much before Ranveer Singh". in.com.
9. "How India Became a Republic - Indian Express". archive.indianexpress.com.
10. Chari, Mridula. "The DD Files: When Shyam Benegal brought India's entire history to TV screens in 'Bharat Ek Khoj'". Scroll.in.
11. "DD to commence repeat telecast of 'Bharat Ek Khoj' to mark Nehru's death anniversary". Indian Television Dot Com. 25 May 2013.

External links

• Bharat Ek Khoj on IMDb