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INTRODUCTION
The contribution of Jaina authors, both monks and lay-men, to the heritage of Indian literature and to the wealth of intellectual life in ancient India, are varied and valuable. All along the Jainas have been a peace-lovir community, and naturally they nurtured tastes and tendencies favourable for developing arts and literature, the concrete expressions of which are seen in their magnificent temples and monumental literary compositions
According to Jainism. greater prestige is attached to the ascetic institution, and the ascetics form an integral part of the Jaina social organisation which is made up of monks, nuns, lay-men and lay-women Monks and nuns have no worldly ties and responsibilities, they persue their aim of liberation or muktı through spiritual means, they not only practise religion bur also prea to all those who want to follow the path of religion Lay-men and lay-women are expected to carry out their worldly duties successfully without violating the ideaology of religion, and it is a part of their religious duty to maintain the monks and nuns without any special invitation to them. Thus the formation of the social structure is well conceived and properly sustained.
The members of the ascetic institution, naturally and necessarily, devoted major portion of their time to the study of Jaina scriptures and composition of fresh treatises for the benefit of suffering humanity. Thus generations of Jaina monks have enriched, according to their training, temperament and taste, various branches of Indian literature. The munificence of the wealthy section of the community and the royal patronage have uniformly encouraged both monks and lay-men in their literary pursuits in different parts of India, at least for the last two thousand years or so. The importance of scriptural knowledge in attaining liberation and the emphasis laid on sastra-dana have enkındled an inborn zeal in the Jaina community for the preservation and composition of literary works, both religious and secular, the latter too, very often serving some religious purpose directly or indirectly The richness and variety of Jaina contributions to Indian literature can be partly seen from works like the Jaina Granthavalı (Bombay 1909) and the Jinaratnakosa Vol. I, (Poona 1944) The latter is an alphabetical register of Jaina works (mainly Sanskrit and Prakrit) and autbors, and, thanks to the indefatiguable labours of Prof HD, Velankar, It is sure to prove a land-mark in the progress of the study of Jaina literature,
The study of Jaina literature has a special importance in reconstructing the history of Indian literature Chronology is the back-bone of literary history, and in this respect, Indian literature, generally speaking, lacks in definite datas of authors and their works The Jaina author is almost always an exception to the rule if he is a monk, he specifies his ascetic congregation and mentions his predecessors and teachers, if he is a lay-man, he would give some personal detail and refer to his patron and teacher, and in most cases the date and place of composition are mentioned. I may note here one such case, by way of illustration, so hindly supplied to me by Acharya Jinavijayajı, Bombay. "According to a verse from an old and broken palm-leaf Ms. of the Visesavasyakabhasya in the Jaisalmer Bhandara, Jinabhadra Ksmasramana composed [the word is broken] that work in the temple of Jina at Valabhi when the great
