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584
The Unknown Pilgrims
naturalness, a naturalness which blended perfectly with an unremitting perseverance; patient endurance in the face of so many difficulties and complex situations; a goodness and compassion which made of her a fervent sādhvi, a capable and much-loved guruņi and a pioneer who imparted a decisive new impetus not only to the sādhvis, but to the whole gaccha.30
In order to immortalise the testimony of the life of Sadhvi Punya the saṁgha of Jayapura crected a samadhi-mandira in her memory 31
B-Jaina Kokila
The Jaina cuckoo, Sadhvi Vicaksaņa Śri
Sādhvi Vicakşana known far and wide by the name jaina kokilā, the Jaina cuckoo,32 is also, by reason of her lineage, a Daughter of the Desert. She possesses all the characteristics of her race. Mowever, while continuing the line of valiant sădhvis who followed in the wake of Sādhvi Punya, she belongs to another generation. Through her the tradition is continued but, at the same time, she is in her own person a sign of openness, of renewal.
Sadhvi Vicaksana was born into a Kharataragaccha Jaina family in 1912, four years after the Great Departure of Sadhvi Punya. On her mother's side, the new pravartini, Sadhvi Suvarna,33 was her kinswoman. She received dikşā before marriage, which at that time was still an uncommon occurrence. She is still in our midst and is one
30 Ibid., ch. 44.
31 Cf. P 254.
32 kokilä: the female cuckoo.
33 Cf. P 255.
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