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DATE OF LORD MAHĀVIRA RECONSIDERED
Dr.G. V. TAGARE
When we were school-boys in early 1920s, we were taught the fiction of the Aryan invasion of India as "History". To impress the comparative modernity of Indian culture, we were told that the Bactrian ambassador Magathenes (M) was at the court of Candragupta Maurya (CM). It did serve the imperial objective of a foreign ruler to instil in us a sense of inferiority viz. We are by nature a submissive race conquerred by every foreign aggressor since times immemorial and that our civilization is not very old as claimed by our records. Thus we were told that Lord Mahāvīra and the Buddha belonged to the 6th Cent. B. C.
It is, however, our misfortune that even 40 years after political independence, the same myths are taught as "History" to our grand-children and text books still repeat the imperialistic rot.
The fact of the matter is that if M. is to be believed as per his records, he was not the contemporary of CM. Indikā the original work of M. is not now extant. But Long extracts quoted by pliny, Solinus (52 5), Arrian (Indikā I. IX) unanimously state that there were 153 kings between Dionysus, the first invader of India and Alexader the Great, and that the period between the two kings was 6451 years and 5 months. As is welknown M. was accredited to the court of pātliputra (Mod. Patnā). His informants were naturally the Brāhmins who relied on their own records about the number of ruling dynasties at Pataliputra and the total number of yeares of their dynastic rules.
Now in the Vayu Purāna (Va. P.) II. 1, 135 ff, it is stated that Prthu, the son of Vena, was annointed by gods (Devas) as the FIRST KING (Adirājā). He levelled the earth, encouraged agriculture, cattle-breeding, Commerce and building cities and villages. A reference to the dynasties of kings (Vaṁsānucarita) as recorded in the Vā. P. and other Purăņas shows that the number of kings between Pșthu and Candragupta I of the Gupta dynasty (and not Cm.) is 153. (The number 154 in some Purāṇas can be explained as Bharadvāja whom Bharata adopted, was never crowned but it was his son Vitatha who was crowned and the discrepancy between 153 and 154 as given in some Purāņas is explained.) The number of years between Pșthu
| SR No. | 524574 |
| Book Title | Tulsi Prajna 1993 02 |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Parmeshwar Solanki |
| Publisher | Jain Vishva Bharati |
| Publication Year | 1993 |
| Total Pages | 166 |
| Language | Hindi |
| Classification | Magazine, India_Tulsi Prajna, & India |
| File Size | 7 MB |