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JAINISM IN SOUTH INDIA
Besides the legend of Santara Jinadatta, another interesting piece of evidence is available to prove the alchemist pursuits of the followers of the Jaina creed. Some of the labels engraved on the pedestals of the images called Rasasiddhas at Rayadrug' in the Bellary District, which we have noticed before, mention two Jaina teachers and two lay followers of the faith, who seem to have been connected with the authorship of the images. One of the lay followers belonged to the fold of the Yapaniyas. Rasāsiddhas or Rasasiddhas, it may be noted, were the ascetics who indulged in alchemist practices.
CLOSING OBSERVATIONS: This brief survey has revealed a volume of interesting and authentic facts regarding the history of Jainism in South India and proved our enquiry highly fruitful, even beyond our expectations. When I started my investigations into this subject I did not gauge their significance in full and never expected that the harvest would be so very rich. The material is plenty and the sources are numerous, particularly the epigraphical and the iconographical sources, which constitute the most reliable testimony for historical reconstruction. These have not been properly tackled so far, and this is the first attempt of its kind to make a correlated study of the various sources though on a modest scale. An exhaustive study and fuller appreciation of the material is calculated to bring to light many more important aspects of the history of Jainism in the southern parts of peninsular India, which would contribute substantially to our knowledge of Indian religion and culture.
If the Jain antiquities and epigraphs in the Tamil country are rich and vast, those in the Kannada country are richer and vaster. Jainism was the dominating religious faith of this region for centuries. As the poet. has affirmed, the charming land of Karnataka was the cherished abode of the Jaina religion. Jainism had penetrated into almost every nook and corner of this province; and wherever, we go, our searching eyes are confronted with the Jaina relics, temples, sculptures and inscriptions. This is perhaps true in a greater measure in respect of the unexplored area of the Hyderabad Karnāṭaka. The results of a careful investigation and close study of the Jaina antiquities and inscriptions in parts of the Hyderabad State made by the present writer are being published here for the first time as an essential component of this volume, under the caption of Jaina Epigraphs, in the following pages.
Bhuta. The relics associated with this story are still pointed out to the visitors at Sonda in the North Kanara District, which is one of the seats of the Vädiraja Matba. An. Rep. on S. I. Epigraphy, 1914, Appendix B, No. 109.
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2 This statement is contained in the following beautiful verse from an inscription: जिनधर्मावासवादुत्तमळविनयदागारवादन्तु पद्मासननिर्पासमवादत्तति विशदयशोधामवादन्छु विद्याधनजन्मस्थानवादत्तसमतरदुर्गभीरसङ्गेहवादत्तेनिसल्कि तुळ्ळनानामहिमेयोळेसेनुं चारुकर्णाटदेशम् ॥ ( Ep. Carn, Vol. VIII, Sorab 261; A. D. 1408.)
