MAHAKSHANA – Moments That Shaped The Mahabharata By Arun Krishnan

In Mahakshana, Arun Krishnan offers a new retelling of the Mahabharata by stepping inside the minds of the men and women who shaped its course, capturing them at the moments when choice becomes destiny. Rather than recounting the epic through a single protagonist’s eyes, the book moves from one pivotal moment to another, placing a different central character at the heart of each episode.

What distinguishes Mahakshana is its attempt to look beyond the actions recorded in the epic and imagine the inner lives behind them. The book introduces readers to the thoughts and motivations of its central characters while retaining the sweep and chronology of the Mahabharata. Written as historical fiction, it takes a rational approach to the epic, treating it as Itihasa and setting aside miracles to focus on the people, choices and consequences at its core.

For generations, the Mahabharata has been retold through individual characters and their perspectives. Mahakshana instead brings multiple perspectives together to tell the story of the entire epic, asking readers to pause at the moments they may already know and consider the human being standing inside them.

About The Author

Arun Krishnan is an engineer by education, scientist by training, entrepreneur by accident, storyteller by passion and musician by instinct, but his favourite title is ‘girl-dad’.Krishnan is the author of the acclaimed The Battle of Vathapi trilogy and Daughter of Two Rivers, a book that has been long-listed for the IGF Archer-Amish Award for Storytellers and shortlisted for the 2026 S.L. Bhyrappa Prize for Indian Historical Fiction.