Studies in the Bhagavati Sutra

Author(s): J C Sikdar
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 313

288 STUDIES IN THE BHAGAWATI SŪTRA [Ch. V that the dairy farming was a part of the agricultural economy of those days by which a section of the people earned their livelihood, as it is indicated by the incidental references to milk? (khīra), curd (dadhi), butter (navaniya), clarified butter (ghaya)" and jars of milk, of curd and of clarified butter respectively.
As regards the poultry farming the text does not give a clear idea about it, but the incidental references to the egg of hen (kukkuļi amdaga), chicken (kukkudapote), cock (kukkuda), pigeons (kavoya)," and swan or duck (hamsa)10 suggest that there was probably the cultivation of poultry carried on by the private management of some members of the society.
The picture of the agricultural economy as depicted in the BKS is also found in other Jaina works.
In addition, they give a clear idea of agriculture which was carried on by the peasants in a systematic way.
Thus the Brhatkalpa Bhāsyal shows that the arable land was the very basis of the rural economy and it was counted as one of the ten most valuable external possessions, viz. buildings, gold, seeds of grains, wood-fuel and grass, friends, relations, conveyance, articles of furniture, male and female slaves, and utensils.
It was classified into two groups, viz. Setu" (the agricultural field having mounds for irrigation from artificially made water sources) and ketuls (the land where crops may be grown during the rains) on the basis of the two different systems of irrigation, viz. artificial and natural as demanded by the exigencies of the geographical, physical and climatic factors of the region.
The Setu land was cultivated by the peasants witb the help of artificial methods of irrigation, such as by the Persian
1 Bhs, 11, 11, 429 ; 16, 6, 581.
2 15, 16, 6, 581. 3 16, 18, 6, 631. 11b, 11, 9, 417 ; 15, 1, 541 ; 16, 6, 581. 6 16. 16, 6, 581.
Ib, 7, 1, 269. 7 16, 18, 8, 640. 3 Ib, 12, 8, 460. 9 I6, 15, 1, 557. 10 16, 13, 9, 498. 11 Brhatkalpa Bhāsya--1,825. Vide 'Life in ancient India', p. 89. 12 Avaśyaka Sūtra, 6. 13 Nāyādhammakahão, I. Țikā, 1, p. 1.