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FOREWORD The present volume is the English version of a Gujarati edition of Siddhasena's Sanmati Prakarana by the two learned scholars, Pandit Sukhlalji Sanghavi, Head of the Department of Jain Śāstra, Benares Hindu University and Pandit Bechardāsji Doshi, Nyāya Tirtha, Professor of Ardhamagadbi, S. L. D. Arts College, Ahmedabad.
When their edition of Sanmati-Tarka with the voluminous commentary of Abhayadeva was published by the Gujarat Vidyapitha of Ahmedabad between the years 192 and 1931, in five volumes, it was proposed to bring out a companion volume in Gujarati, comprising mainly, an introduction to the original work and a concise yet original, critical exposition of its text, as edited in the preceding volumes with Sanskrit commentary. Owing to political crises, however, the Vidyapitha had to be closed and the intended work was consequently published in the "Pünjābhāi Jaina Granthamālā" in 1933, of which the present volume is an exact English rendering, with the exception that the portion dealing with the discussion of the various manuscripts from which the Vidyapitha Edition had been prepared has been entirely left out from this version, as it was seen that it would serve but little purpose, if any, to the English-knowing public for which the present volume is intended.
The question of the date of Siddhasena demands, however, a fresh discussion, as new material bearing on this aspect has been discovered in recent years, after the publication of the original work in Gujarati in 1933. In the light of these discoveries, it is probable that
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