amar chitra katha mahabharata read online in english

The company lost money during the initial years of publication, mostly due to the prejudice parents had against comics, in general. In the stories on modern-day heroes, a more personal style was used to tell young readers about their early years, likes and dislikes and the milieu they grew up in.Īmar Chitra Katha had by then increased the frequency of new titles to one every fortnight. These mythological tales from the epics were followed by stories of historical figures such as Rana Pratap and Mirabai and later, by adaptations of classics that included Ananda Math by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and the lives of such famous historical figures as Jawaharlal Nehru, Louis Pasteur and Hieun Tsang. The aim was to bring out a new comic every month. Many of these titles saw several reprints. The comics were affordable, starting at 75 paise and then going up to ₹2.50.ĭetailed research was conducted for every story reproduced in comic form, with Anant Pai and his team poring over ancient texts to get the storyline right while his illustrators studied temple sculptures and calendar art to depict the characters’ figures, clothing and settings perfectly. The format of each comic remained the same - a 30-page tale told compellingly, with a wealth of detail and footnotes added to explain certain terms, especially relating to customs and rituals. With the introduction of computers and the digital drawing board, however, artists were able to work much faster by creating templates.

Everything including design and layout was done by hand but the results were perfect. Each panel had to be hand-lettered using rulers to get the spacing just right. Because of financial constraints, these were printed using only three colours - yellow, blue and green. Other titles followed: Shakuntala, Savitri, Nala Damayanti, Harishchandra. The title went on to sell half a million copies.

It is said that 10,000 copies of the first edition of Krishna were printed and it took about two years to sell them. The first comic from Amar Chitra Katha (ACK) was Krishna, written by Anant Pai himself in 1969 and illustrated by Ram Waeerkar.

This reportedly prompted him to start writing Amar Chitra Katha (Immortal Illustrated Stories) comics (published by India Book House) that would teach children about their own folklore, tradition, mythology and culture using simple language and eye-catching illustrations. The story goes that in February 1967, when Anant Pai was watching a quiz aired on Doordarshan, he was shocked and disturbed that the participating children could answer questions on Greek mythology easily but were flummoxed when it came to a simple question from the Ramayana: “What is the name of Rama’s mother?” Apparently, his nephews and nieces would write stories with British characters and settings, which showed that they were reading, or listening to, only these stories.

Amar chitra katha mahabharata read online in english