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The Homeless Ones
435
• The Tapāgaccha sādhvis come for the most part from Gujarāta, especially Saurāșțra and Kaccha, though they also have several groups in Panjāba, in the districts of Ambala, Ludhiyānä and Amộtasara, most of these being sādhvis from refugee families from Pakistan, from the district of Lāhora.
- The Kharataragaccha sādhvis are for the most part from Rājasthāna.
- The Sthānakavāsi sādhvis are of more diverse origin: Gujarāta, Rājasthāna, Madhya Pradeśa, Mahārāștra, Panjāba. - The Terāpanthi sādhvis are all from Rājasthāna and in particular from Māravāda.
As for their social background, a fair number of the sādhvis come from villages and from the artisan or trading communities. A much smaller number of them come from towns, from a background of business, small industries and, more rarely, from the liberal professions. Their families are often part of a group of fervent Jainas, among whom the religious tradition is preserved, spiritual exercises are practised, particularly pratikramana and fasting and by whom the munis and sädhvis are revered and given an attentive hearing. Vocations to the state of vairāgini thus come into being and are nurtured for the most part in a propitious soil and favourable atmosphere.
E - Family circumstances
At this point we need to go back in imagination to the end of the last century in order to get a more precise idea of the various conditions within family life that were conducive to an urge towards vairágya, indifference towards the things of this world, and to an attraction for renunciation. Not infrequently the sole refuge, in a girl's or young woman's life was to adopt the state of vairāgiņi. These conditions, complex as they were on account of both historical and social factors, prevailed up to these last years and still do so in certain villages of Rājasthāna and Gujarāta.38 What is of particular interest to
38 Cf. P 87 ff. The sādhvis in the various biographies explain these factors very clearly.
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