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Book Review: Supercop of Aryavrat by Mithilesh Kumar

Supercop of Aryavrat is a mythological adventurous novel, written by Mithilesh Kumar. So far, there have been many mythological novels written by a host of authors like Amish Tripathi, Devdutta Pattanaik, and Chitra Banerjee, and so on. Those all novels did good by fictionalizing the stories of gods that we Indians normally worship, and they distantly or closely remained connected to the epic sagas such as Ramayana and Mahabharata. Being fictionalized in different angles, made the stories look zesty and interesting reads. And if we talk now, it is becoming a fad among all sorts of writers to write a novel playing around the Indian mythology. One strong reason is that its periphery is immensely vast.



Today we have this amazing novel 'Supercop of Aryavrat' by the author Mithilesh Kumar. This novel is based in and around the life events of Krishna. The best thing about this novel is that it is fragmented and tried covering all major and not-so-known events about Krishna.

So, first understand that in the ancient times Aryavrat was a vast region, something like today's Indian subcontinent. There were many kingdoms in it, then. Krishna was based in Dwarka. Thus, he was also known as Dwarkadheesh.

The novel kicks off with Krishna brooding under a tree and recollecting his actions that he did for his people, and also repenting on being used by Yudhishthira. And, soon the novel steers towards the main landscape of the story. This novel is a coming of age. The author takes us to the time before the birth of Krishna – what made Kansa go after Krishna, and how the former died eventually. Well, that part is known to many and even have been shown at various TV shows.

Putting it more openly, the novel explores the dares and actions taken by Krishna to help the people of Aryavrat, even outside his kingdom. In the process, he made many fans and friends, and on the other hand, he also got the taste of betrayal and animosity and what it takes to deliver justice holistically.

The novel is full of events. Thus, putting it into chronological order is like revealing a lot about the subplots. However, we would like to say that the book is packed with action and gets into the deeper abyss of personal and professional lives of people that mattered most at the time of Krishna, for instance Karna, Pandav, Kunti, and many ladies that were part of Krishna's life.

Even the powerful godly-figure like Krishna had to vie to hand over the justice to the deserving couples during the Swayamvara (marriage ceremony). Particularly, Krishna had to intervene many a time to save girls before landing up in wrong hands, for example in Draupadi Panchal's case, how did he manage to side corner Karna. And at one instance, how he persuaded Jarasandh to give up the Swayamvara dream for his son.

Further, a close look reveals that Krishna was like a family member with Pandav and Kaurava. He had good rapport with Duryodhan, but before Mahabharata, he gives his army to him, and he himself chooses to be with Arjun, without lifting weapons. Krishna sounded mean and diplomatic at number of places, but that was required to save humanity from time and again.

Also, there are some instances that are not so particularly circulated among masses. One is the selfish nature of Yudhishthira and how he manipulated the words of his mother Kunti to exploit the beauty of Draupadi, and next, we see him losing everything in a gamble against Duryadhan for no apparent reason.

It took a lot of diplomatic courage for Krishna to help Pandav winning the war against the Kaurava. Talking about enemies, not many have known that Jarasandh was a big guy to be defeated. Krishna literally used Bheem to get rid of him.

Through the aspects like Swayamvara manipulations, ego clashes, secret crushes and relationship affairs, the author manages to provide readers real-life glimpses of the people of the Mahabharata epoch whom we often look from a distance or probably do not know them from a within the possible range.

It’s good that the author has given importance to chores and events that were veiled from the masses, over the known events like wars and politics. 

Yes, the book deserved to be stood tall among all high-rated mythological fantasy/thriller authors of India. The kind of pace and narration and inclusion of characters from time to time is something that collectively keeps moving the story incredibly. Highly recommended novel!
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