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Samantbhadra Swami.
- The desire to imprint the importance of -ntas on the hearts of scholars was so great that he had made all of India the stage for his debates. He never waited for someone else to invite him to a debate, nor did his mental disposition allow him to be satisfied with letting those who were falling into the abyss of falsehood (khaddas) due to ignorance, continue doing so. And therefore, wherever he heard of a great debater or a large debating hall, he would go there and, by striking his debate drum, challenge the scholars to debate. Hearing the drum, the debaters, as per custom, would gather at the debate venue with the public, and then Samantbhadra would eloquently discuss his principles before them, and also declare that anyone who had any objections to any of those principles should come forward for a debate. It is said that people were mesmerized by the eloquent speech of Samantbhadra's Syadvada • Nyaya, weighed in the balance of truth, and were unable to oppose it in any way— if ever
* In those days, during the time of Samantbhadra - according to Fa-Hien (400 CE) and Xuanzang (630 CE), it was customary to keep a drum (a bheri or a nkkara) in a public place in the city, and any scholar who wanted to propagate a doctrine or, in a debate, wanted to prove his scholarship and skill, would strike the drum as a declaration of debate.
- History of Kannada Literature.