When it comes to re-telling of Mahabharata, Jaimini, student of Ved Vyasa has been considered as ancient Indian scholar and has been held as a great esteem. But unfortunately due to its lost manuscripts there has been no details about the same. However, two city scholars visiting Chennai Oriental Manuscripts Library came across some palm leaf manuscripts which turned out to be Jaimini's version of the epic.

Retired IAS officer PRadip Bhattacharya and Major General Shekhar Kumar Sen, were researching on the ‘Mahabharata’. They could not decipher the Grantha (Sanskrit texts written in Tamil script) on the leaves and had to bring in someone to translate it into Devanagari. 

As per the report published in The Times of India, “Bhattacharya said, “It was then that we realised we had stumbled upon a treasure trove. They were Jaimini's manuscripts, something that had eluded all eyes for so many hundreds of years.”

The scholars found both complete and incomplete manuscripts by Jaimini. Of the complete ones, they chose 'Mairavana Carita' and 'Sahasramukharavana Caritram' to work on. "We found the National Manuscripts Mission was as excited as we were about the discovery. The Mission joined us in publishing this first ever critical edition of the texts along with the English translation in verse," Bhattacharya said.

Both the texts that were found by the scholars deal with episodes not found in Valmiki's 'Ramayana'. While 'Mairavana Carita' deals with the demon Mairavan who kidnaps Rama and Lakshmana to be rescued by Hanuman, the 'Sahasramukharavana Caritram', also called the 'Sita Vijay', is a story where Sita dons the warrior's garb to fight and kill Ravana's brother.

While they were researching, the two scholars traced the stories to Cambodia where they found ancient paintings on palaces and temple walls corroborating them. 

"Rather than Krishna's dominance, we read about Hanuman, a Shiva devotee, as the hero. In the second book, Sita embraces the power of Shakti/Kali to decimate the thousand-headed demon. These are unique stories that we had never heard before and are part of Jaimini's imagination. At a time when Vishnu loomed large over our epics, you see a clear Shaivaite and Shakta influence in these two works, which are of great importance for scholars," Bhattacharya explained.