There are two accounts of the life of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj which are contemporary in nature and which were written either on his instructions or the instructions of his family.
One is in Sanskrit; the other is in Marathi.
The Sanskrit narrative is the Shree Shivabharata, composed by Kavindra Paramananda. It was written, so states Paramananda, at the behest of Shivaji Raje, and can be considered as an official, authorised account.
The Marathi account is the Sabhasad Bakhar Chronicle, written by Krishnaji Anant Sabhasad, a member of Rajaram's official apparatus, on Rajaram's instructions in Jinjee in Tamil country.
While both are biographical accounts, the Shivabharata is in verse and the Sabhasad Bakhar in prose.
S.M. Divekar took great efforts to bring to light the Shivabharata, got a Marathi translation of the Shivabharata done in 1927 by Rajaram Damodar Desai, and edited that text and translation. The Sabhasad Bakhar was translated into English by the historian Surendra Nath Sen in 1920 and has been in circulation for more than a century.
Until now, however, no English translation of the Shivabharata was available, though it is a document of equal significance. In fact, it could very well be seen as a document of some what greater significance than Sabhasad's because Paramananda wrote it during Shivaji Raje's lifetime, and Sabhasad, though a contemporary of Shivaji, composed his some years after Maharaj's death.
This English translation is thus the first genuine, accurate one that is completely faithful to the original Sanskrit text. Its importance lies in the fact that it brings a key historical document, indeed a primary source related to Maratha and Indian history, to light for a vast readership.
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