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A, D. 638, according to a Burmese inscription, is dated sakarāja 657 at Bodhigaya." "This date”, he says " however, shows that the Buddhist era, as used in Burma in the fifteenth centuary was 544 B. C". E. M. Abhesinghe, 30 on the basis of Jaina literature, criticising the view of Seneviratne, says that" We know that Buddha was countemporaneous with Bimbisāra, and it with the Jainas, we identify Swāmi Gautama or Gautama Indrabhūti with Lord Buddha, the first disciple of the Jaina Tirthařkara Mahāvīra, we can approximately fix, from both these sources, the date of the great demise at 544 B. C. '31
In connection with Abhesinghe's conclusion I would like to make a few comments. His suggestion, in support of 544 B. C. being date of the Buddha's demise, that Gautama Indrubhūti and Gautama the Buddha are identical, is incorrect. They were different personalities. One was the Ganadhara or Explainer of Mabāvira's preachings, while the other was the founder of Buddhism. One died at Gunāvā in. Rājagraha at the age of ninety two, 12 years after the attainment of salvation by Malāvīra, while the other died at Kusinārā at the age of eighty and attained nibbāna.
In the light of the aforesaid evidences we can now conclude that the most probable date of the birth of Buddha therefore, is 624-623 B. C. We make this deduction as he is supposed to have lived for 80 years, as he himself says in the Mahaparinibblinasutta of the Dighanikaya before his death that he was of 80 years of age ( athititaro me vayo vattati ). Thus the date of the Buddha's parioirvāni may be decided at 544 B. C. ( 624-623 B. C.-89-544-543 B. C.).
