Asoka (Shahrukh Khan) grows up in a environment where he is hated by his step-mother and half-brother Susima (Ajit). His mother and brother put up continuous efforts to poison his father, King Bindusara's, (Gerson Da Cunha) mind against him. Susima's eyes are all set for the throne of Magadha and he makes several attempts to kill Asoka but in vain. Finally, Asoka leaves Magadha to save his life and outside Magadha , he meets Princess Kaurwaki (Kareena Kapoor) who too has escaped from Kalinga after her parents were murdered. Asoka and Kaurwaki fall in love with each other and get married. Asoka gets shattered on one instance when he learns that Kaurwaki along with her brother Prince

becomes that of ruling the world. He marries again to Devi (Hrishita Bhatt) who tries her best to make him overcome his past life but fails. Meanwhile Asoka in his endeavour to become an Emperor wages a small war against Kalinga where he realises that Kaurwaki is alive. He goes searching for her and then comes a turning point in his life when he sees the badly mutiliated bodies and mourning relatives on the battlefield. He gets extremely pained by all this bloodshed that he has caused. He takes over to Buddhism and starts a new life searching for enlightenment. This is what the film Asoka is all about.
 

and Films Pvt. Limited. Asoka is one of the most expensive films made in the recent times and Director Santosh Sivan though has chosen a historical subject has failed to depict the life of the Emperor in whole. He has mainly focussed on Asoka's love for Kauwaki possibly to attract the modern audience of today. As a cinematographer, santosh Sivan's work is good but not as a co-writer alongwith Saket Choudhary since there are many loopholes in the script. Dialogues by Abbas Tyrewala is well-written. Music by Anu Malik is good, not excellent. The audience expected better numbers from this much-hyped film. Only "Raat ka Nasha" and "Roshni se" can be termed as melodious. "San sanana "

charisma. He has proved his versatility in this one movie alone showing the contrast in his character from the fierce emperor to a romantic lover. He has worked too well on his character and has acted very carefully putting his soul and mind into the role. Kareena Kapoor, too has acted very well and this film can be termed as her best film till date. She has been lucky to get this role so early in her career. Suraj Balaji as Arya is outstanding and his death sequence has been brilliantly executed. Danny has been wasted. Hrishita Bhatt proves her talent and the audience are truly looking forward to seeing more of her films in the future. Rahul Dev has acted well enough to leave an impact. The others are OK.
   
Overall, Asoka is worth a watch being such a unique film.