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(266) Nandanavana
him mental shock and turned him towards detachmental life for the service of the religion and community. He worked incessantly (from 1901-40) until his health failed in 1939 with a serious disease of tremors and he died on February 10, 1942 in Lucknow.
He was bestowed with many honours like 'Dharmadivākara' (Sun of Religion), Yuga Puruşa (Man of the Age) etc. for his reformist, literary, journalistic, and liberal promotional and enthusiastic activities and ideologies. He had good contacts with eminent persons and scholars of society like Seth Manikchand J.P. (Bombay), Seth Hukamchand (Indore), Lalchand Sethi (Ujjain), A. P. Goyaliya, K. P. Jain, C. R. Jain, Devendraprasadji (Arrah), Magan Ben (Bombay), M. N. Kapadia (Surat), Swami Satyabhakta (Wardha), and many others.
He vowed for celibacy in 1909 and lived like a Jaina ascetic to devote his full time in his missionary objectives. Though he did not have formal education in Jaina religion, but due to his Jinistic upbringing, he enjoyed studying Digambara, Śvetāmbara, Tāraṇapanthi, spiritualist and non-Jaina literature specially Buddhist and Theosophy along with western literature. This study made him liberal and harmonising person. He learnt at least twelve languages by himself to broaden his studies.
There are rare people who work regularly for 18 hours a day for the cause of religion and society. In fact, he was a missionary with the object of promotion and reformation of Jainism. He had wide fields of interest including archaeology and promotion of Jaina system abroad. He was nationalist by nature and wore yellow khādī robes after undertaking the vow of celibacy.
Literary Activities
He was a vociferous writer in original, translation and cementation. His first article was published in Hindi 'Jaina Gazette' in 1896. Since then, he has been continuously in the field of literary activities. As an editor of 'Vira' (1923-27), Jaina Mitra (1909-27), Jaina Gazette (English) and 'Sanatana Jaina', he wrote many inspiring articles to encourage new generation to pursue the cause of bringing progressiveness in the society and promoting Jaina literature in a modern way. He has a total of about 80 publications to his credit including 30 books in original in Hindi, 7 books in English (some in
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