Jain Journal 1973 10

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 42

Jainas in Bihar in the Seventeenth Century
SURENDRA GOPAL
The seventeenth century was a land-mark in India's commercial history. The establishment of a uniform political system over Indian territory extending from Kabul to the Bay of Bengal and from Kashmir to the Narmada by Akbar ensured security of life and property and thus created favourable conditions for the development of long distance overland intra-Indian trade. Hence, as compared to preceding centuries, the movement of traders and goods between different parts of the country considerably increased. Thus Gujarati Jaina traders in the reign of Shahjahan and Aurangzeb could be found in the far-off Lahore1 and the Punjabi Ksatris could be found as far as Bengal and Gujarat. The Deccan plateau was also visited by traders from other parts of India.2 Such visits underlined the fact that whenever these traders found business unremunerative at a particular place for any reason or due to a combination of circumstances, they would not hesitate to shift their activities to distant parts of the country where they could hope for better profits and congenial environment. An important example of the movement of business community is provided by the migration of the Jainas to Bihar in the seventeenth century. Needless to say, the emergence of the Jainas in the markets of Bihar is a fine testimony to their-entrepreneurship, ability to stick to profession in spite of difficulties.
Bihar contains several Jaina holy places. Ksatriyakunda, the birth place, and Pavapuri, the place of nirvāṇa of Mahavira, the twenty-fourth Tirthankara, are in Bihar. Samet Sikhar, where twenty out of twenty four Tirthankaras attained nirvāņa is also in Bihar. Rajgir is another holy place of the Jainas in the province. Hence, the area as such was not unknown to them. But adverse political circumstances till the midsixteenth century had acted as disincentives and prevented them from setting up business in Bihar. In the time of Akbar not only this constraint had disappeared but new incentives had emerged.
1 Mirat-i-Ahmadi, translated by M. F. Lokhandwala, Baroda, 1965, p. 176.
2 Mahamahopadhyay Meghavijay, Digvijayamahakavya, ed. by Pandit Ambalal Premchand Shah, Bombay, 1945, p. 13; Devanandamahakavya, ed. by Pandit Bechardas Jivaraj Doshi, Ahmedabad-Calcutta, 1937, pp. 15, 16.
3 Several Jaina inscriptions of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries have been found in Bihar.