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Bhaskaravarma of Dandi and Bana: An Appraisal
A makeavara referred to by Bana and changed to Vasanta Bhanu by Dandi who wrote his work more as a romance than as a chronicle as illustrated by Bana who was writing the factual chronicle of Harsa. Dandi's Romance has shrouded fact by fiction, the latter normally revealing its real by conjectures. Sarabharaja the maternal grandsire of Goparaja and Bhanugupta mentioned in the Eran stone Pillar inscription of Bhanuguptadated 510 A.D. may be considered as the Asmaka lord involved in a series of strifes with the contiguous Kindgoma. Dandi as a romancer could har dly preserve the faithful account more accurately than Bana who was writing the chronicle of Harsa. There is another possibility. Sarabha, meeting, his end by the strategem of Kunilavas, might have been changed to Pracandavarma by Dandt being not the same person as Sarabharaja of Eran inseription. This Sarabharaja might have been a different person. Pracandavarma-Vasanabha u-apisode might have been one single unit divided into two by Dandi both getting the same treatment at the hands of Visruta who acting the role of a leader of the 'Ripupurush' employed the device. of Kusilavas on both of whom Pracandavarma might have been a better contender for supremacy in comparision to Vasantabhanu and Mitravarma etc. Hence Pracand varma of Dandr appears to be more akin to the Asmafetvara Sarabha of Bana.
Finally we come to the point of Bhasakaravarma of Dandt and Bhits karavarma of Bana. Do the two Prose writers refer to one and the same Bhaskaravarma in his early minority and youthful majority or two different persons hailing from two different regimes in two different epochs far removed from each other. Dindt has referred to Bhaskaravarmā as a son of Anantavarma and a grand son of Punyavarma king of Vidarbha and a scion of the Bhoja lineage. Dr. V. V. Mirashi has identified Bhaskaravarma with Harisana's grand son who regained the ancestral throne with external help and could not maintain it for long in so far as Vidarbha was occupied by Kalachuris about fifty years after the death of Harisena (Vakataka King)4. He defines Vidarbha as comprising of Vatsa-Gulma country which extended from the Narmada in the North to the Godavari in the South. He identified Afmaka as lying directly to the South of Malaka (Aurangabad District,48. These identifications of Dr. Mirashi go against the idea of Bhaskaravarma of Dandi and Bana being considered as one and the same person in his Minority and Majority. But Dandi has referred to the shore of Narmada where all the vassals of Asmaka-lord assembled with armis to offer assistance to the war between Anantavarma and Bhanuvarma the two kings of Vidarbha and Vanaväst.40 Dandi has named Avantidiva as the king of Kuntala whom Aš naka lord extirpated alongwith other. vassals except the king of Vanaväst, whom he gave only
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