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JAINISM IN SOUTH INDIA (ie, modern Adargunchi) in favour of the Jaina temple at Uchchangi which belonged to the monks of the Kāļür gana of the Yāpanīya Samgha. Vahchangi, it may be noted, is identical with the present day neighbouring village Buďarsingi.
An important monastic organisation of the Yapanīyas was the Nandi Samgha and a well-known branch of this was the Pannāgavsikshamūla gana. Most of the preceptors figuring in the epigraphs belong to this gaña, The Vrikshamūla gana mentioned in an inscription from Döņi noticed before, appears to have been identical with the Punnāgavrikshamūla gana. Besides this gana, the Yapanīyas had other influential, though less known, monastic orders. They are the Kumudi gana described in the Garag and Mugad charters; Kandur gaņa mentioned in the Adargunchi, Hosūr, Hubli, Hõli, Hullūr and Saundatti epigraphs; Maduva gana occurring in the Sodam record; Vandiyūr gaņa referred to in the Ādaki, Sūļi, Tengali and Manoli insoriptions; and Kāreya gaña and Mailāpa apvaya met with in the Badli, Hanniköri, Kalbhvki and Saundatti insoriptions. Existence of all these ganas has been colleotively noticed here for the first time. No gachchha is associated with the Yāpanīyas, though Nandi Samgha itself seems to have been referred to as Nandi gachchha in an inscription from the Andhra region. This inscription is the Maliyapūņdi grant of Ammarāja II, reviewed in detail while dealing with Jainism in the Andhra Dēša. In this epigraph mention is made of the Maduva or Köțimaļuva gana of the Yāpaniya Samgha and Nandi gachchha. This is the only instance so far known, revealing the existence of the teachers of the Yāpaniya Sangha in the Andhra country.
No evidence is available so far to show if any preceptors of the Yāpaniya Sangba bad penetrated into the Tamil country.
SVĒTĀMBARA INFLUENCE: Though no direct proof is forthcoming in regard to the activities of the Yāpaniyas in the Tamil land, I am inclined to think that their reformist precepts and liberal practices had much to do in shaping the traditions of the Jaina church in that region even to a larger extent, so to say, than in Karnātaka which was their stronghold. No doubt, as I have discussed before, the Svētāmbaras also had led their missions at an early age in South India; the Svētāmbara monks were in a prosperous state in the area of Banavāsi in the 5th century A. D.; and traces of their following are to be notioed in the southern part of the Telugu country till as late a period as
1 An. Rep. on S. I. Epigraphy Nos. 34 and 3 of 1941-42. Near the village Adargunohi is a
shrine dedioated to the deity popularly known and adored under the pame Doddappa. As indioated by the name, the idol is fairly big; bat on sorutiny it is revealed that the image is of Mahā virm. The village folk are quite innocent of this fact.
