Indian Antiquary Vol 41

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 171

JULY, 1912.]
KING LAKSHMANA SENA OF BENGAL
167
KING LAKSHMANA SENA OF BENGAL AND HIS ERA. BY PROF. NALINIKANT BHATTASALI; COMILLA,
THE account of the termination of Sena supremacy in Bengal has received wide notoriety from the writings of Minhaju-d-Din Saraj, the author of the celebrated historical work Tabaqat-i-Náṣiri. very school-boy of Bengal knows how the daring Maḥammad, son of Bakht-yår, fell upon Nadia ith a party of seventeen horsemen, and how the aged Rai Lakhmaniah slipped off through the Ostern gate. There was a fresh stir in Bengal about the matter by the publication of a picture me years ago, entitled "The flight of Lakshmana Sena"-by the late lamented artist -urendranath Ganguly. Minhaj's statements were sharply criticised recently, after the ablication of the picture; all the historians in Bengal setting themselves in right earnest to sprove Minhaj's statements. The most important effort in this direction has been that of abu Rakhaldas Banerjee, M.A., of the Indian Museum in Calcutta, who submitted a paper to the Asiatic Society of Bengal and also delivered a lecture on the subject in the first monthly eeting of the 16th year of the Bangiya Shahitya Parishat (Bengal Academy of Literature) of Calcutta. In these he attempted to prove that the reign of Lakshmana Sena ended long before the raid of Muhammad Bakht-yâr and consequently that it could not by any means be Lakshmana Bena who fled from Nadiâ.
His arguments are as follows:-Four inscriptions, he says, are at the root of the present gitation
(i) The Gayâ inscription, bearing the name of Aśokavalla,-dated 1813, Nirvana era.1 (ii) The Buddha-Gayâ inscription of Aśokavalla dated thus:
"Srimal-Lakhmanasenasy-útita-rajye Sam. 51 Bhadra-dine 29." 2
(iii) Another Buddha-Gayâ inscription of Asokavalla dated thus:"Ermal-Lakshmayadeva-pádůvánattardjys
1 Ante, Vol. X., p. 341. Ante, Vol. X., p. 346.
Sam. 74 Vaisakha-vadi 12
Gurau." 3
(iv) A third Buddha-Gayâ inscription of Asokavalla. It is not dated, but it serves to prove that king Asokavalla mentioned in all these four inscriptions is one and the same person.*
Mr. Banerjee has rejected the date of the first inscription as being uncertain and useless. is discussion centres round the dates of the second and third inscriptions. He accepts Dr. Kielhorn's view that the era of Lakshmana Sena began in A. D. 1119-20; and then he seeks to explain the word atîta in the two dates by quoting Dr. Kielhorn. That eminent scholar wrote (inte, Vol. XIX, p. 2, note 3)-" During the reign of Lakshmana Sena the years of his reign would be described as Srimal-Lakshmanasenadéva-pâdânâm rajye (or pravardhamana-vijayarajye) Samvat; after his death the phrase would be retained, but Atita prefixed to the word rajye, to show that, although the years were still counted from the commencement of the reign of Lakshmana Sena, that reign itself was a thing of the past." Now, the second inscription of this series bears the date 51 of atita-rajya. Therefore the reasonable conclusion is that Lakshmana Sena must not have reigned for more than 51 years. The Lakshmana Sena era began in A. D. 1119-20, and Mr. Banerjee has tried to prove that the era began from the coronation of Lakshmana Sena. Therefore Lakshmana Sena could not have reigned beyond 1119+51=A. D. 1170. Muḥammad Bakht-yár on the other hand raided Nadiâ by A.D. 1200. Therefore the raid of Nadiâ happened long after the death of Lakshmana Sena. This is the main drift of Mr. Banerjee's argument.
Jour. Bomb. 4s. Soc., Vol. XVI., p. 359.
⚫ Cunningham's Mahabodhi, p. xvviii. c.