Jain Journal 1991 07

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

Page 6

Five and Twenty Glorious Years
I am glad that the 'Jain Journal is celebrating its Silver Jubilee this month.
Jaina journalism is more than hundred years old. The first Jaina journal was the Gujarati weekly Jain Divakar, published in 1875 at Ahmedabad. The first English journal was the monthly Jaina Gazette, started in 1903 by C. S. Mallinath from Mylapore (Madras). The editorship of Jaina Gazette was later taken over by Late Pandit Ajit Prasada who published it from Ajitashram, Lucknow till 1950. After Pandit Ajit Prasada's death in September 1951, Shri Kamta Prasad Jain started Voice of Ahimsa from Aliganj, Etah (U.P.). After Mr. Kamta Prasad's death, Shri Ganesh Lalwani started the Jain Journal from Calcutta in 1966. The torch lit by Pandit Ajit Prasada has been kept glowing by Shri Ganesh Lalwani. Kudos to Lalwani for his twenty-five years of able editorship !
At present 125 Jaina periodicals are being published. Of these seven are in English and seven are quarterlies. Of the seven quarterlies and the seven English Journals, none can beat or match the Jain Journal. The lofty thoughts, the scholastic discipline and the high moral tone with which the Jain Journal was started in 1966 has been maintained throughout till today.
I still look with nostalgic memories at my own article on the 'Doctrines of Jainism'; and my English renderings of two operas written in blank verse in Hindi, The first was by late Dr. Ram Kumar Verma, the doyen of Hindi Literature. It occupied one full volume (X, 2) of Jain Journal and appeared under the title 'Hail Vardhamana'. The other was an operette on a Jaina legend in Bengali written by the Editor and translated in Hindi by Sm. Rajkumari Begani and retranslated in English free verse by me. It appeared in Volume XII, No. 2 under the title 'Obeisance to Moon of Love
What distinguishes the Jain Journal from all other periodicals on Jainism is that articles in it are mainly contributed by foreigners