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fact that it is really the starting point for an account of South Indian Jainism The initial fact of Digambara tradition is the division of Jainas into Svetambara and Digambara, which starts from here Bhadrabahu's migration in the company of Chandragupta Maurya was followed by other missions to the south such as that of Kalakacharya and of Visakhacharya The latter was an eminent Digambara preacher who penetrated Chola and Pandya countries in South India The spread of Jainism in the Tamil country received impetus on the advent of another great Acharya called Kundakunda who was evidently a Dravidian and in fact the first in almost all the genealogies of the Southern Jainas The Imperial Courts of Kanchipura and Madura gave sufficient patronage to the spread of Jainism in the Tamil country When the Chinese pulgrim Yuan Chwang visited these two cities in the 7th century AD, he found in Kanchipuram a majority of Digambara temples and at Madura a number of Digambaras.
It is accepted by historians that from the beginning of the Christian era down to the epochmaking conversion of the Hoysala King Vishnuvardhana by the Vaishnava Acharya Ramanuja in the 12th century AD, Jainism was the most powerful religion in the South, and the most attractive and acceptable too.
One of the Pallava Kings of Kanchipuram, Mahendravarman I (600-630 AD), a few Pandya, Western Chalukya, Ganga, Rashtrakuta, Kalachuri and Hoysala Kings were Jainas.
