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Jaina Community - A Social Survey
astronomy, mathematics, or books of fiction, epics and stories, sometimes—but only sometimes and always indirectly and impliedly - embodying materials of a sociological character.1
From these circumstances it is clear that the material available in the various kinds of Jaina literature is comparatively very meagre for the purposes of a social survey of the Jaina community. For a full social survey of the Jaina community detailed information is required about the conditions relating to the social institutions like marriage, family, caste, religion, etc. and the miscellaneous social customs, and manners. Such a type of information is not readily found in Jaina literature. In the previous chapters an attempt has been made to utilise whatever information is readily available.
It is evident that for several reasons the information available in Jaina literature is quite insufficient for our purposes. The material is not only scanty but it is also scattered at different places. Generally a specific social problem is not dealt with in all its aspects. Many a time only stray references are made to social conditions prevailing at a particular time. Obviously, such references are applicable to certain parts of the country. Further, in many cases it appears that the information cited might have been obtained from indirect sources. As a cumulative effect of all these factors it goes very difficult to have a complete picture of the social conditions of the Jaina community. It is not that the information is of no use at all. It definitely serves the purpose of at least providing the rough back-ground existing in the past regarding various social conditions. What is needed is to supplement the information available in ancient Jaina literature by the information gathered in various ways in more recent times.
Of late, Social surveys of various communities have been carried out by communal or non-communal bodies. But uptil now no such survey has been made about the social conditions prevailing in the Jaina community at a particular time. When the Census Reports and District Gazetteers were compiled for the first time information regarding the social conditions of the Jainas in several parts of the country was collected. It can be asserted that the information so collected was not complete in many ways. As the Jainas formed a very small proportion of the total population
