Vishwambharnath Sharma Kaushik ki Lokpriya Kahaniyan (Hindi Edition)

It was heartening to see the Sahitya Akademi remember Vishwambharnath Sharma Kaushik, a contemporary storyteller of Premchand, with a national symposium on his 125th birth anniversary. It was heartening that when his birth centenary fell in 1991, no celebrations were held anywhere in the countryneither in Haryana, where he was born, nor in Uttar Pradesh, where he breathed his last. Despite being a multifaceted creator and editor, Kaushik left his mark everywhere, whether it was stories, novels, humorous and satirical writings, or editing the magazine Hindi Entertainment. Whether it was depicting womens suffering, the problems of joint families, Hindu-Muslim issues, or the World War, Kaushiks pen was unmatched everywhere. His works not only exhibit genre diversity, but he also experimented extensively, while contemporary writers of his time refrained from experimentation. Vishwambharnath Sharma Kaushik holds a supreme place among storytellers who wrote about social concerns and the subtle emotions of human beings, steeped in narrative essence. He played a significant role in establishing the Hindi story genre. Hindi writing was less common at that time, and people generally wrote in Urdu or English. He did commendable work by writing in Hindi. Before him, Jaishankar Prasad and G.P. Srivastava were writing in Hindi. Guleri and Premchand followed. Like Premchand, Vishwambharnath Sharma Kaushik also wrote over three hundred short stories. This collection presents a selection of his most popular stories.