20 May,2026 09:29 AM IST | Mumbai | Mayank Shekhar
Sunny Hinduja as Vimal Khanna from the Amazon MX Player series by the same name
As an essential character-trait, Vimal Khanna (spiffy Sunny Hinduja), lead character of the crime thriller named after him, tells the security-head of the mansion, where he's employed, that - as a rule, he never drinks more than two pegs.
And that's because: "Do tak chadti hai. Uske baad main sabki utaarne lagta hoon! (Two drinks get me high. After that, I start lowering other people's buzz!)."
The Haryanvi security guard and Vimal, thus, become drinking buddies. Otherwise, Vimal, hired as a caretaker, spends his working hours at the bedside of his ailing, rich boss, who got paralysed from a road accident once.
To entertain the old man, Vimal reads aloud from a crime-thriller paperback, titled, Purane Gunah Naye Gunahgar (1963), with the protagonist, Sunil, a journalist cum amateur detective.
Hindi writer Surender Mohan Pathak, on whose story the show is based
Why's this book significant? It marked the beginning of Hindi pulp-fiction writer Surender Mohan Pathak's career - so extraordinarily prolific that it's hard to ascertain how many books has Surender Ji authored since.
Each, more often than not, belongs to a separate series of books, spinning a universe with a given hero - Sunil, Sudhir, Jeet Singh, Pramod, Mukesh Mathur, Vivek Agasheâ¦
And, apparently, the most popular, Vimal Khanna - on whom the said Amazon MX Player series, starring Sunny Hinduja, is based.
The show's story is credited to "Shree Surender Mohan Pathak", as if the honorific was his first name. Its screenwriter, Uddeept Dutt Gaur, tells me, "By now, Surender Ji has written 341 books. Of which 157 belong to the Sunil series, 122 to Sudhir series, 48 books with (anti-hero/outlaw) Vimal Khannaâ¦."
Emerging from a generation when novellas, magazines of multiple genres equalled mass entertainment in India, Surender Ji remains the king of Hindi crime fiction.
His fans call themselves SMPians. Call his books what you will - AH Wheeler/railway station bestsellers (surpassing millions in sales), potboilers, penny dreadfuls, dime novels - B-grade lies in the hands of the beholder.
Why's it that I've heard of Surender Ji, all my life, but experienced his work, for the first time, only once he's past 86?
That's got everything to do with how, for the longest, the linguistic debate got settled among North India's middle and upper classes - with Hindi as the principal language of the screen, and English to be read for business and pleasure.
Vimal Khanna, that dropped on May 15, 2026, drawing from the first book from the series, Maut Ka Khel, is Surender Ji's onscreen debut.
Rather belated, alright. Given that, I'm told, SMPians have even attributed a copy-cat crime, involving a bank robbery in Vikas Puri, Delhi, to one of his novels, Zameer Ka Qaidi (2005, Vimal series).
Also, reportedly, as per Surender Ji himself, elements of the Amitabh Bachchan picture, Aakhree Rasta (1986), were lifted from his book, Haar Jeet (1982).
Either way, watch the Taapsee Pannu starrer, Haseen Dilbruba (2021), and its bettered sequel (2024) - guess who's the omnipresent pulp-fiction novelist, Dinesh Pandit, in it?
Its screenwriter Kanika Dhillon told me it was squarely a tribute/homage to, among others, Surender Ji. As was the film itself, about a femme fatale.
That's who you encounter in the nine-part Vimal Khanna - with a woman (smartly subdued Isha Talwar), having allegedly entrapped an old, rich bloke. Alongside, Vimal emerges + goes through hell! Vimal's core trait is that he can switch between accents - Haryanvi, Punjabi, Tamilian, Bambaiya âMac'â¦
They will never win Bookers, yes, but what are Surender Ji's books chiefly about? As Vimal puts it in the series himself, "Surendra Pathak Sahab kehte hain, âThere's a secret hidden within everyone - about conversations, relationships, blood⦠In order to survive, you also have to live with those secrets."
For his maiden screen adaptation, the show's producer Piyush Dinesh Gupta recalls Surender Ji gave him the brief that he follows for his own books: "The plot must stay two steps ahead of the audience, who ought to always wonder, âWhat happens next?'"
Screenwriter Uddeept adds, "Also, the stories/characters, from back in the day, had to be updated for current times."
Frankly, I sat through the perfectly easy/comfy watch, Vimal Khanna - less for the chemistry, more for a piece of history.
Tried getting in touch with Delhi-based Surender Ji himself. He's not been keeping well; plus, can't connect on the phone, because he can't hear too well, either. Passed on questions through his daughter, so he can answer over voice-notes, whenever free.
And, yet, the octogenarian has promised the show's producer, Piyush, "a half-century!" As in? Piyush says, "Surender Ji has two more books to wrap up 50 titles of the Vimal Khanna series. He told me, he will definitely finish them. He's on it."
The prize is in the work itself. In the long run, as I've begun to view about life - what ought to be valued more than stray brilliance is sheer consistency. Surender Ji's career feels like that to me.
Mayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture. He tweets @mayankw14
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