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AN EARLY HISTORY OF ORISSA
Identification of the Nandarāja
Now the first problem is the identification of the Nandarāja and also the dynasty to which he belonged. K. P. Jayaswal, at one time, placed Khāravela three centuries after Nandarāja, whom he identified with Nandivardhana. According to the Jaina tradition, Nandivardhana was proclaimed king after Udayin's assassination and sixty years after the nirvāṇa of Lord Mahāvīra, the twentyfourth and the last Jaina Tirthařkara. But Nandi. vardhana was a Saišunāga king and the Saiśunāgas do not appear to have to do anything with Kalinga at all. On the contrary, the Kalingas appear in the Purāņas among the contemporaries of the Śaisunāgas, who were overpowered by a Nanda king with epithet Sarvakshatrāntaku viz., Exterminator of all the Kshatriyas. It is not Nandivardhana but Mahāpadma Nanda, who is credited to have brought the entire land under his sole sway and also uprooted all the Kshatriyas-rather the old reigning houses. We should, hence, identify 'Nandarāja' of the Häthigumphā inscription, who held possession of Kalinga, with all-conquering Mahapadma Nanda—the founder ruler of the Nanda dynasty.
Dr. B. M. Barua,on the other hand, objects to the identification of Nandarāja with a king of the pre-Mauryan Nanda line on grounds that in the Asokan inscriptions it is claimed very clearly that Kalinga remained unconquered (avijita) till the seventh year of Aśoka's reign. But such claims of the Mauryan Secretariat are perfectly at par with the Gupta boasts. Samudragupta, for instance, has been
1. Parisishta parvan, VI, 243. 2. Raychaudhari, PHAI, p. 233. 3. Vāyu Purāna, chap. 99, Slokas 320-328.
IHQ, Vol. XIV, 1938, pp. 259f.
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