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A CRITICAL STUDY OF PAUMCARIYAN
Dandaka, the king of Karnakundalanagara and husband of Maskari once threw a dead serpent round the neck of a Sramana monk who was lost in meditation. Next day the king got surprised with the fortitude of that monk who had remained all along undisturbed. He worshipped that monk. At this a mendicant (parivrājaka) developed jealousy against the monk. He disguised himself as a śramaņa monk and entered the harem of the king. The king lost his faith in the Śramana monks and eventually got all the śramanas crushed to death. One śramaņa monk who had escaped the execution got angry and destroyed the whole city with the fire of his anger. That place was named as Dandakāranya and the king was reborn as a vulture (Grddha).
The PCR (31.54-97) gives the same account. The PCS (35.4) mentions Dandaka as the king of Dandakapura, originally a votary of Buddhism. His wife is named Durnayasvāmini. She became jealous as her husband accepted the Sramaņa faith. She removed her valuables and threw them into a temple to charge the Sramaņas with theft. But the king did not believe in it. Then she intrigued a false Šramaņa monk to sit beside her. This incident enraged Dandaka and he executed the monks. Dandaka and his queen passed through hellish existences. Further the king wandered through several births and was reborn as the bird. The RPS (p. 115) mentions Karnakundalanagara as Karyakundala. Maskari once charged a monk with infirmity of the flesh when he went to her for alms. Then it follows the PCV. The TSP (IV. p. 237) gives a different story. Kumbhakārakața was the capital of Dandaka. Purandarayaśā, the daughter of king Jitaśatru of Śrávasti and queen Dhāriņi was the wife of Dandaka. Palaka, a messenger of Dandaka started corrupting Jitaśatru because he followed the Arhat-faith (Jainism). Skandaka, the son of Jitaśatru silenced
Palaka in a debate. Skandaka renounced the world and along with · his five hundred pupils went to Kumbhakārakața to enlighten his sister.
Palaka secretly planned a plot against Skandaka. He convinced Dandaka that Muni Skandaka was not a monk but a hypocrite who along with his pupils had come there to kill him and to usurp his kingdom. To that effect he managed to produce some weapons alleged to be discovered from the place where the monks had stayed. Then by the order of Dandaka, Palaka crushed all the pupils of Skandaka. At this horror Skandaka made a 'nidāna' to destroy the family and the kingdom of Dandaka. Skandaka also was crushed to death, He became a Vahnikumāradeva. The broom of Skandaka which was, per chance, picked up by a bird fell in the palace of his sister, She apprehended
