Dhurtakhyana in the Nisithacurni

Author(s): A N Upadhye
Publisher: Z_Vijay_Vallabh_suri_Smarak_Granth_012060.pdf

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DHURTĀKHYĀNA IN THE NIS'IT'HA-CŪRŅI
DR. A. N. UPADHYE, M.A., D. LITT.
When I wrote my essay "The Dhurtākhyāna : a Critical Study"!, I knew from a reference that the Nisītha-cūrni of Jinadāsa-gaņi Mahattara contained some information about the rogue Elāsādha. Prof. J. C. Jain, Bombay, later on informed me that he had read something like the Dhūrtākhyāna in that Cūrņi to the text of which unluckily I had no access. It is lately that my friends Dr. B. J. Sandesara and Dr. U. P. Shah, Baroda, kindly made available to me the necessary extracts from the N.-cūrņi, cyclostyled-type-script-ed. by Acārya Sri Vijayapremasūri (Bombay V. S. 1995), vol. I, pp. 92-95. The following observations are based on these extracts, which are given at the close of this essay in an Appendix.
To begin with there are the following three găthās of the Niśīthabhäsya (nos. 294-6) which give the requisite clue words of the illustrative tale:
ससएलासाढमूलदेवखंडा य जुण्णउजाणे। सायंतणे को भत्तं अक्खातं जो ण सद्दहति ॥ २९४ ॥ चोरभया गावीओ पोट्टलए बंधिऊण आणेमि । तिलअइरूढकुहाडे वणगय मलणा य तेल्लोदा ॥ २९५ ।। वणगयपाटणकुंडिय छम्मासा हत्थिलग्गणं पुच्छे ।
रायरयग मो वादे जहिं पेच्छइ ते इमे वत्था ।। २९६ ॥ After these gāthās, the Cūrnī gives in Prākrit prose with a couple of metrical quotations in Sanskrit a fully developed story of the Dhúrtas. At the end we have a sentence like this:
सेसं धुत्तक्खागगाणुसारेण णेयमिति ॥ गतो लोइयो मुसावातो। Looking at the clue words in the gāthās, one can say that the Cūrņi has given all that is obviously hinted in them; but the concluding colophon says that something is remaining and that it should be known from, or completed according to, the Dhuttakkhanaga.
The story given in the N.-cūrņī may be analysed thus : Many Dhúrtas assembled in the Old Park to the north of Ujjaini in the territory of Avanti. Three of them, males : Sasaka, Elāşādha, Mūladeva, and the fourth, a female, Khandapānā : every one of them had five hundred rogues 1. This is included in the edition of the Dhurtākhyāna by Jinavijaya Muni.
Singhji Jain Series No. 19, Bharatiya Vidyā Bhavan, Bombay. 1944.