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60 / The Rāstrakūtas and Jainism
followed Jaina church because of the impact of the Gangas. Kannada became the official language and adopted as their mother tongue, thanks to the Gangas. Following is the statistics and distribution of the Rāstrakūta inscriptions, as I have worked out: out of 516 charters, 340 are in Kannada, 90 are in Sanskrit, 104 are in Tamil, 7 are in Telugu and only one in Marathi, out of 90 Sanskrit epigraphs 19 are bilingual of which 17 are in Sanskrit and Kannada. This predominence of Kannada was due to the power exerted by the Gangas. [Nagarajaiah, Hampa : 1999-B : 54-55).
3.9. The Nolambas of Hēmāvati (C. E. 850-1000), as subordinates to the imperial Rāştrakūtas, extended patronage to Jainism. Donation of gifts to Jaina shrines by Mahēndra-I (860-95), a staunch Jaina by faith, has been recorded in the charters at Hēmāvati and Dharmapuri. He had founded a basadi in the village limits of Kāmagondanahalli and Pattanāyakanahalli, in the late ninth century, of which only a seated Sarvāhņa yakşa sculpture has outlasted. King Mahēndra had also commissioned another basadi at Tagadūr (TN: Dharmapuri) and made provision for its maintenance. A tumbledown temple near the Anehonda, 'elephants pond', on the hill at Niềugal, of Mahēndra's period appears to be a typical Jaina temple with vacant dēvakõșthas inside.
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