Studies in Indian Philosophy

Author(s): Dalsukh Malvania, Nagin J Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 22

PANDIT SUKHLALJI
D. D. Malvania Nagin J. Shah
Pandit (Dr.) Sukhlalji Sanghavi, an eminent Indologist and great thinker, expired on 2nd March 1978, rendering Indology an irreparable loss, for the reason that he had dominated world of Indian Philosophy and religion for the last sixty years and more by his deep scholarship and noble personality.
Born on 8-12-1880 in a Jaina Sthanakvasi family in a small village Limbali in Pt. Surendranagar, Saurashtra, he lost both the eyes at the age of sixteen owing to a virulent type of smallpox. He left the idea of marriage and remained a naisthika brahmacari throughout his life. His real education began after his unfortunate blindness. He had a genuine love for learning. He went to Benaras at the age of eighteen where he studied Nyaya under the late Mm. Pt. Vamacharana Bhattacharya. For the study of Navya-Nyaya he travelled to Mithila where he found a proper teacher in Mm. Pandit Balakrishan Mishra. Then he came back to Beneras where, for some years, he studied different branches of Sanskrit philosophy and literature. From Benaras he went to Agra and engaged himself in editing, with Hindi translation and annotation as well as his own valuable introduction so me highly interesting religious and philosophical books, such as Pañcapratikramana, Karmagranthas, Yogadarsana and Yogovimśikā. In 1922 he joined, as Professor of Indian Philosophy, the Puratattvamandira of the Gujarat Vidyapith, a National University established by Mahatma Gandhi. During his tenure in the said institution he undertook and completed a critical edition of Abhayadeva's commentary on the Sanmatitarka of Siddhasena Divakara, a work which extended to over 900 pages.
From Gujarat Sukhlalji shifted, in 1933, to the Benaras Hindu University, as the Professor of Jaina Philosophy and retired in 1944. During this period he wrote and edited number of works in Sanskrit, Hindi and Gujarati, generally enriched with his own translation, commentary and introdution. Among these might be mentioned the Tattvärthasutra, Jñanabindu, Pramanamimumsa, Tattvo paplavasimha of Jayaragi Bhatta, and Dharmakirti's Hetubindu with Arcata's commentary and Durveka Miśra's sub-commentary.