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PREFACE
The Sacred Books of the Svetambara Jains were published in two or three editions in Calcutta, Bombay and Hyderabad, but they soon became very rare. Since the introduction of Ardhamagadhi in the Bombay University many of these books are being appointed as texts for several examinations and students always experienced great difficulty in procuring them. The published editions, moreover, could hardly claim to be critical in any sense of the term and as such were unfit to be used by a critical University Student. I therefore undertook, at the suggestion and support of Shet Motilal Ladhaji of Poona, the task of preparing the first critical edition of the Sutrakrtanga, the Second Book of the Jain Canon, of which I am just publishing the first part. The second part, which it is hoped will be published without much delay, will contain an introdụction, critical apparatus, word-index, notes and several appendices. I very much regret that for some reasons I am not able to bring out the complete edition in one volume and am thus compelled to crave the indulgence of the reader for its being issued in parts.
Willingdon College,
1st August 1928.
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P. L. V.
