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A Note on the Jaina Sculptures at Palma
PRATIP KUMAR MITRA
Palma, a village situated at a distance of about twenty kilometers from Purulia town along the Purulia-Manbazar road in the Purulia district of West Bengal, was noted long ago as a site of ancient Jaina settlement. A description of the antiquities of this place was first published by Dalton8 in 1866 basing his account on the observations made by Lieutenant R.C. Money, which was reproduced also in Hunter's Statistical Account.* Dalton refers to a principal temple which was “on a mound covered with stone and brick”, and to numerous Jaina Tirthankara images lying at different places. One of these images was larger than life-size which was "broken away from the slab on which it was cut, and the head, separated from the body, lies near". Round about this temple mound were other mounds covered with cut stone and bricks.5 Dalton's account however contains a serious error regarding the location of Palma which he states was within a few miles of the station of Purulia and near Cossai river. This led Coupland' to tag the description of Dalton to a place named Balarampur of some antiquarian importance. Blocho visited Palma in 1903, but being unware of the controversy could not elucidate
1 Palma (J. L. No. 551) is situated at 86° 28' East (longitude) and 23° 13' North
(latitude) under the Puncha P.S. of Purulia district. Cf., Suphal Mondal, Purulia Pariciti (in Bengali), Purulia, 1981, p. 62 ; also, Census 1961 West Bengal : District
Census Handbook, Purulia, Calcutta, n.d., p. 385. . The place lies between 20 km and 21 km posts along the Purulia-Manbazar Road. * E. T. Dalton, "Notes on a Tour in Manbhum in 1864-65", Journal of the Asiatic
Society of Bengal, Part I, No. III (N.S. no. cxxxiv) Calcutta, 1866, pp. 186-87. 4 W. W. Hunter, Statistical Account of Bengal, Vol. XVII, London, 1877, pp. 298-99. 6 Dalton, op.cit., pp. 186-87. . Ibid, p. 186. ? F. H. Coupland, Bengal District Gazetteer-Manbhum, Calcutta, 1911, pp. 263-64.
See also, D. R. Patil, The Antiquarian Remains in Bihar, Patna, 1963, pp. 13-14,
and p. 356. 8 For Balarampur see, J. D. Beglar "Report on a Tour through the Bengal Provinces
in 1872-73," Archaeological Survey of India Reports, VIII, Calcutta, 1878, p. 183; Subhas Chandra Mukhopadhyay, "Balarampur-er Mandir" (in Bengali), Chatrak,
3rd year, No. 4, Purulia, 1380 B.S., pp. 221-30. • T. Bloch, Annual Report of the Archaeological Survey, Bengal Circle, For the year
ending with April, 1903, Calcutta, 1903, p. 14.
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