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62
THE JAINA GAZETTE
my friand Mr. M. Pandit, B.A. (Oxon) Bar-at-Law of Bombay: He posted it to me at Allahabad; but I never got it! So I had to do the whole thing again. Thus it was only in 1916 that my Jaina Law saw the light of the day. Being the only book on the subject, it held the field entirely for 10 years and more.
Later, in the short gaps of leisure between my official duties and ill-health, translated also the Vardhamana Niti and Indra Nandi Jina Samhita.
Sir (then Dr.) H. S. Gour made some obvious and insulting blunders in his Hindu Code (first edition). At my suggestion the enthusiastic and energetic young men of Delhi—the Jaina Mitra Mandal-took up the work of exposing the erudite Doctor of Nagpur. He shilly-shallied, promised and performed not the right thing for many a long day and wasted much time and temper on both sides, But in the second Edition of the Hindu Code, even his ignorant obstinacy has been conquered by a sense of obvious .nistakes, and he has removed some of the grossest objections to his former work.
At this juncture, the Jaina Mahasabha at Lucknow (1920). under the Presidentship of Brother Champat Rai founded the Jaina Law Society and I, as its Secretary, with the help of my Delhi friends, did as much as could be done in a weak, disorganised, dispersed community. As Brother Champat Rai says : " This committee began its work well, but in the end it also failed to accomplish its object owing to various causes such as the difficulty of bringing together its meinbers from distant places, and the like" (p. !0).
This Committee collected together all the texts and translations available on the subject. These it printed in book form, of which only the “Confidential". Proofs were circulated. My intention was to publish a revised edition of my Jaina Law on the basis of these proofs. The work under Review forestalls me, but only partially. I say "only partially," because I have a revised and enlarged edition of my small book also in hand, and if no obstructive karmas intervene, it may see the light of the day as
soon as such works usually do. Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com