Samudaya, a pioneer cultural organization of Karnataka established in 1974 which spearheaded a cultural movement for creating awareness amongst the people, is now on the threshold of 38th year of its existence. It used proscenium plays, street plays, drama festivals, painting exhibitions, seminars and jathas for this campaign.
Apart from inculcating scientific temperament, social consciousness and cultural harmony in the minds of people, especially youth, it strove hard to maintain the unity and integrity of our nation. Many well-known theatre personalities like M.S. Sathyu, Prasanna, B. V. Karanth, Devendra Raj Ankur, Badal Sircar and others have been associated with the group, which also conducted month long culturaljathas through-out Karnataka in 1979 and later on issues like farmers' problems, drought, world peace, etc. Samudaya has to its credit of a huge 120 feet long painting depicting the evolution of man and carrying the same throughout the country.
The play begins with two university scholars visiting Pampa's hometown, Dharmapuri, in search of evidence of his work in his old age, and their encounters with characters from the past, who have witnessed the events. The plot moves forward with Pampa rising from the stone inscription erected in his memory by his friend and the Samantha king, Arikesari, and he also meets his favorite character from the Mahabharata, Karna.
The focus shifts to Karna and Pampa’s journey through the Mahabharata in search of answers to the former’s questions about injustices done to him in Pampa's rewritten Mahabharata. In the course of this journey one experiences the hard realities of caste-based politics in society from then till now, from the injustice done to Karna because of his caste to the political conspiracy leading to the murder of Pampa, carried out by the then business classes, the Jains and the Brahmins.
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