Gangadhar was the rebirth of Shri Satya who had formed the Suryanshi Sect after the war of the Mahabharata 7,500 years ago. He got his powers from 7 spiritual gurus who had blessed him with mystical yogic shakti and trained him in ancient combat forms. During his training, Shaktimaan was taught to energize the 7 chakras of body through Kundalini Yoga that helped him to get mystical and supernatural powers. He also conducted the ritual of death in order to get total control over his powers. This process, instead of killing him, made him almost immortal and stronger than any mere human being. Towards the end the Suryanshis performed a Yagya (Yajna) through which he entered holy fire and immersed his physical body in it. After which the five natural elements of life, namely fire, earth, water, wind and sky invigorated his body and he gained further super powers from these elements. Eventually he transformed into a super human warrior in order to fight against the forces of evil in the world and ultimately became the super hero Shaktimaan.
He lives as a funny geek named Pandit Gangadhar Vidyadhar Mayadhar Omkarnath Shastri, while maintaining his secret identity as Shaktimaan.
Shaktimaan’s arch nemesis is Tamraj Kilvish, who is the living embodiment of the evil and dark forces of the world.
Powers
Shaktimaan possesses various superpowers like incredible strength, ability to move fast by rapid rotation and is almost invincible. He cannot be harmed by mere mortal weapons. He also has the ability to fly at the speed of light, ability to voluntarily change his size, powerful vision, invisibility, ability to control the five elements of nature and immortality. He can divide his physical body in five different bodies of sky, earth, water, wind and fire. He can also transform his body into pure light and move with the speed of light. Shaktimaan also has the ability to shoot beams of laser from his fingers, toes and other parts of his blessed body. He can also stretch his various body parts to great lengths. Shaktimaan is also an expert at different martial art forms and has the power of telepathy, teleportation, etc.
The only weakness of Shaktimaan lies in a crystal that is filled with all the evil of the world. The crystal is possessed by his arch rival Tamraj Kilvish, and is the source of his dark powers.