Setubandha

Author(s): Krishnakant Handiqui
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

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that Anurāga is another name of the poet which he records in the concluding verse of each Canto. Anurāga is, in fact, one of the poets to whom a few verses of the Gathäsaptašatı are attributed by the commentators of that work; but there are also some verses ascribed to Pravarasena separately. There is no reason to assume that the same writer is quoted under two different names.
Krşņavipra's reference to the authorship of the Setubandha is more difficult to understand. He calls Pravarasena the Mabārāja of the Prākṣtas; and the phrase used by him is curiously like the peculiar expression employed in referring to the kings of the Vākāțaka dynasty in their inscriptions. He says at the end of his gloss on Canto 1: iti prakstānām mahārajaśrz-Pravarasenasya rājñaḥ skandhakākhye kõvye etc., followed by the remark: prākytānāmiti nirdhārase șaşthi.1 Another commentator Krşņadāsa makes exactly the same remark except that he uses the word madhye after prākstānām, making any grammatical observation unnecessary. Krşņavipra is a South Indian, and Krşņadasa appears to be the same. It is difficult to say what they mean by praksta. Besides, Krşņadāsa goes on to say that Vaakappam is the name of Pravarasena's family (Pravarasenakulasya nama).
The colophon at the end of the Setutattvacandrikā commentary refers to Pravarasena as a 'Cāhuāna king'. The statement is obviously wrong, as no king of that name is found in any of the branches of the Cauhān dynasty, which, besides, belongs to a rather late period of Indian history.
(1) Kielhorn, while editing the Bālāghāt plates of Přithivīşeņa II (EI, Vol. IX, p. 267),
remarks: 'Here and in the cognate plates the Vākāțaka kings have the title Mahārāja followed by the word śri prefixed to their names, and before the title there stands in each case the genitive vākāțakānām, e.g. vākāțakānām mahārāja-sri-pravarasenasya.. From the grammarian's point of view such a construction would be objectionable.' It was probably to meet such an objection that Krşņavipra thought it necessary to explain the nature of the genitive in the expression recorded by him.