Jaina Shrines In India

Author(s): O P Tandon
Publisher: Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Vovernment of India

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Dispersal of Shrines
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Deuliya temple. This brick temple belongs It would be interesting to classify and to the rekha class of Orissan temples having arrange the various figures of the Tirthana straight and perpendicular garbhagriha karas and associated Jaina images which with a curvilinear sikhara. The temple is have been discovered from different sites of plain but the sikhara is richly ornamented East India. Since the fortunes of the faith with scroll-work and the Chaitya window have never been constant, marked developpattern.
ments and decay are noticed in Jaina art.
Architectural remains, copiously found Some noticeable Jaina icons were found
throughout the region, have not been proin Midnapur district. They are all of the
perly studied but it is possible to distinguish Tirthankaras showing fine workmanship of
the medieval monuments from those of the the tenth-eleventh centuries. In the same
early settings. In many cases, it is possible class of images, figure the images of Pārsvanátha from Deul Bhira (Bankura) and
to relate the various icons to some deul
(temple) from where Jaina images with the images found at Ambikanagar, Chitgiri,
cult marks have been recovered and which Barkota, Pareshnath, Chiada, Kendua and
are not accidental. such other sites from where Debala Mitra discovered a number of Jaina relics.
In Orissa, the entire Mayurbhanja and
Cuttack areas evince traces of Jaina temples The village of Pareshnath (Pärśavnātha)
and images. The very few Jaina images had a temple dedicated to the same Tir
that have been found in relief inside the thankara. At Kendua also architectural
caves at Surajpohar (district Goalpara) in fragments of a stone temple were found.
Assam, tell of a feeble approach of Jaina On both of these sites, Pärsvanātha's images
enthusiasts in this far east corner of India. were discovered. This area encircling
In the Mughal period, Jaina mercantile Ambikanagar was an important centre of
communities settled in the east. Two Jainism.
inscriptions from Dacca record the erection Ruined Jaina shrines are located in the of Jaina temples by the members of a Jaina districts of Dhanbad and Purulia. Some mercantile community which hailed from such sites are Chara, Sanka, Sanera, Boram, western India. Traces of Rajasthani origin Malrampur, Palma, Arsa, Deoli, Kakhira, can be seen in the Jaina temples at Jiaganj Lathondungri and Dulmi. At Deoli and Ajimganj near Murshidabad. The (Purulia) there was a parichayatana group of famous Badridas temple in Calcutta is a temples.
work of decorative architecture.