Authorship Of Vakya Kanda Tika

Author(s): Ashok Aklujkar
Publisher: Ashok Aklujkar

Page 17

The Authorship of the Vakya-Kānda-Țikā
181
it to be Vakyapadiya-prakāśa or Vakyapadiya-prabha. Then alone would it balance with Prakirņaka-prakāśa, the name for the com: mentary on the remaining kāņda. Furthermore, it is quite clear from the opening statement of the Vākya-kanda-ţika (BSS p. 63) as well as from the contents of the first two books that sabda is the principal concern of the first book and vākya of the second. The title Sabda-prabhā would, therefore, be hardly appropriate for the second book. In fact, any title not containing the word Vákya would not suit that book. Therefore, I am inclined to think that the title of Helā-rāja's Vākya-kānda-ţikā was Vākya-pradipa. It alone would form an appropriate link with Sabda-prabha and Prakirnakaprakāśa, and suggest a progression from prabhā 'flame' to pradipa ‘lamp' to prakāśa 'light'. It would also perhaps explain why the scribes have been occasionally misled to write Vākya-pradipa in the place of Vakyapadiya in certain manuscripts (AbhyankarLimaye 1965:57 fn. 6; Rau 1962:379-382, 384, 386; S. Iyer 1963: 119.20). Note also that in the second concluding verse of his Prakimnaka-prakaśa (after 3.14.624, p. 272) Helā-rāja likens his commentary to a pradipa.
5.1 As should be clear from 2.2 above, the aim of this paper is not to refute the claim of Punya-rāja's association with the second book, or to deny him the authorship of the summary verses, or to establish his identity with Helä-rāja. Within its context, therefore, one can justifiably ask who this Punya-rāja is and where he stands in relation to Helā-rāja. Rajendralāla Mitra (1877:112) and Ramakrishna. Kavi (1930:235 fn. 3) have suggested that Punya-rāja may be the same person as Puñja-rāja, the author of a commentary on the grammar Sārasvata-prakriya and of two works on poetics entitled Dhvani-pradipa and Sisu-prabodhalańkāra.1. This identification may be said to derive some support from Nägeśa's use of the form Puñja-rāja (see 3.2 above), from the similarity between the two names (ñj can simply be a dialectal variation of ny), and from the fact that both Punya-rāja and Puñja-rāja are associated with works in the discipline of grammar. The date of Punja-rāja would also not stand in the way of identification. That Sārasvata grammarian is definitely known to have lived between 1475 and 1520 A.D. (Gode 1941:120-124, 1953:6872; cf. Haraprasāda Shāstri 1931:134-136; Jambūvijayaji 1966:32), whereas the earliest manuscript in which Puṇya-rāja's summary verses are most probably (see 2.1 above) found, namely E[4],
1. The last work is edited and published by B. L. Shanbhogue in the Journal
of the Oriental Institute, vols. 12-14, 1962-1965, Baroda. It is also published as no. 7 in the M.S. University Oriental Series.