Shivaji: The Great Maratha
About this ebook
'The epic text of Ranjit Desai's Shriman Yogi finds new voice in Vikrant Pande's nuanced translation, an immersive narrative of the foundations of the Maratha empire and the saga of its charismatic founder.' - Namita Gokhale. Young Shivaji reaches Pune, a dying fort city, with his mother Jijabai and lights the first lamp within its ruins. While his father Shahaji Bhosle is away on deputation by the Adil Shah sultanate after having failed in a revolt against it, Shivaji learns how an empire is built from the ground up. Thus begins the life of the Great Maratha. What awaits Shivaji is nothing short of the vast scroll of history, and it takes him from Surat to Thanjavur and all the way to Aurangzeb's durbar in Agra. He dreams of freeing his land from the clutches of Mughal rule, and though he suffers many defeats and personal losses along the way he never gives up his vision of Hindavi Swaraj. Amidst political intrigue and a chain of skirmishes, Shivaji becomes a leader, a warrior and a tactician par excellence, driven by immense pride and love for his motherland.
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About the author
Ranjit Desai (8 April 1928-6 March 1992) was born in Kolhapur district, Maharashtra. Biographical novels were his forte. His most famous works are Morpankhi Sawalya, Shriman Yogi and Swami, based on the life of Madhavrao Peshwa, the third Peshwa. He won the Maharashtra Rajya Award (1963), Hari Narayan Apte Award (1963), the Sahitya Akademi Award (1964) and the Padmshri from the Government of India (1973).
Vikrant Pande has published fourteen translations till date, many of them bestsellers, like Ranjit Desai's Shivaji: The Great Maratha (HarperCollins) and Girish Kuber's Tatayan, published as The Tatas: The Family That Built a Business and a Nation (HarperCollins), which won the Gaja Capital Business Book Prize for 2019. He cowrote, with Neelesh Kulkarni, In the Footsteps of Rama: Travels with the Ramayana (HarperCollins), a travelogue containing unknown stories of Ramayana, which is now being made into a travel show by a top OTT producer, as well as Akashvani: A Century of Stories from All India Radio (HarperCollins). He also authored The SBI Story: 200 Years of Banking (Westland Publications). He is currently working on an account of fascinating operations done by the special forces (HarperCollins). A graduate of IIM Bangalore, Vikrant Pande enjoyed twenty-five successful years in his corporate career before turning to writing full-time.
