B i l h a Æ a' s VikramÁ©kadevacarita and Its Neo-Expounders By Dr. Murari Lal Nagar Sahityacharya, Kavyatirtha, Kavyasindhu M.A., Doctor of Library Science Second Ed. Revised International Library Center Columbia, MO 1999 2 BilhaÆa's VikramÁ©kadevacarita And Its Neo-Expounders CONTENTS ÚMUKHAM iii AN APPRECIATION viii DVIT•YAM ⁄MUKHAM x INTRODUCTION 001 CHAPTER I. Specimens of Textual Difficulties 043 II. Some Lexicographical Points of Interest 255 III. Secondary Source Material Relating to VikramÁ©kadevacarita 271 IV. Verses Ascribed to Bilha∆a in Anthologies 278 V. Conclusions 295 Appendix I: On CaritacandrikÁ 298 Appendix II: C¡lukya Cola Empires 313 Bibliography of Misra 314 Anubandha˙ 316 Index 318 3 Úmukham Rasadhvaner adhvani ye caranti sa©krÁntavakroktirahasyamudrÁú. Te'smatprabandh¡n avadh¡rayantu kurvantu ≈eß¡˙ ≈ukav¡kyap¡ ham. Bilha∆asya. Gu∆adoß¡n a≈¡strajña˙ kathaµ vibhajate jana˙. Kim andhasy¡dhik¡ro'sti r¶pabhedopalabdhißu. K¡vy¡dar≈a˙. ˛abd¡rtha-≈¡sana-jñ¡na-m¡tre∆aiva na vedyate. Vedyate sa hi k¡vy¡rtha-tattvajñaireva kevalam. Dhvany¡loka˙. Gir¡m pravƒttir mama n•ras¡'pi m¡ny¡ bhavitr• nƒpate≈ caritrai˙. Ke v¡ na ≈ußk¡m mƒdam abhrasindhu-sambandhin•µ m¶rdhani dh¡rayanti. Bilha∆asya. Pavitram atr¡tanute jagad yuge smƒt¡ rasakß¡lanayeva yatkath¡. Kathaµ na s¡ madgiram ¡vil¡m api svasevin•m eva pavitrayißyati. ˛r•harßasya. 4 The book has a very long story and a sad one too. Throughout the book--here, ther e, and everywhere--I have explained why it was composed and who are the adhikÁrin s. It is an outcome of fifty years of studies and research in the field of Sanskrit scholar ship. But it was written in America where I did not have enough bibliographical resour ces easily accessible. So many of the statements and quotations are derived from the memory. AnabhyÁse vi§am ÅÁstram! Moreover, I have been completely out of touch of Sanskrit studies during the last 25 years, which I have gainfully utilized in the servic e of Library Science and building up of a worthy collection of Indic studies at the Univ ersity of Missouri - Columbia. The book was written in 1977. It was a kind of Åokaú Ålokatvam Ágataú. During the academic year 1978/79 I was in Mysore on sabbatical. Even there my main focus was TULIP--The Universal/Union List of Indian Periodicals. It was my earnest desire to loc ate a worthy collaborator for BilhaÆa. I found one. He was super--par excellence. But he had his own problems and delayed, and delayed, and delayed, and ultimately aban doned the assignment. Finally I got the typescript back to Columbia. It was revised and retyped. It was se nt back to an able editor in India. He was recommended by one of my closest and trust worthy friends. He did not do anything! Maybe it was beyond his limited knowledge. Maybe it was not his field. Then I got it sent to a publisher. He demanded sixty thousa nd rupees just for production--all the editorial and proofreading work had to be extra a nd beyond. When I asked the publisher in terms of the return, rupees and paise, he had no ans wer. Then I got the typescript sent to another editor. He demanded Rs. 15000/- just f or editing it! I had no money to squander in that manner. Once for all, I abandoned all the hopes of ever getting a generous collaborator inspi red by the same spirit that had been prompting me all along. There was none there wh o was for dharma, artha and kÁma with equal division and preponderance. I was born and brought up in India and continuously lived there for thirty three year s before I came to America for advanced studies and research and a Ph.D. By now I h ave lived in America for three decades. It is my home. I have a firm conviction, base d on my own personal experience, that many people in India imagine that every tom, dick, and harry in America is rolling in dollars. There is no poverty, no squalor, no wan t. There is no needy person. All are well to do. Even a mazdoor drives a car! When I arrived in this country for the second time in 1965, one of my friends in Indi a wrote to me to the effect that at that point I was in a country of plenty and abundanc e and thereonwards I won't feel any monetary need. I wrote him back to the effect: " Yes, it is true. Every house in America is blessed in its courtyard with a Tree of Dollars . The householder has just to get up in the morning and shake the tree. The dollars just shower until the shaking stops!" 5 America may seem a land of plenty for those who have never toiled and suffered h ere, but it is built by the bones of toilers and joined by the blood, sweat, and tears of th e sufferers. America has been made what she is. It was not discovered the way she is now. The wealth of America has been drawn from the bosom of the Mother Earth. It is not fallen down onto the earth from the open skies. Neither it is an imperial creation. Well, this was an aside. Maybe some eyes get opened wide enough to realize and per ceive the truth. Once again and for the last time, I got the typescript back to Columbia. It was in Fe bruary 1990. Thirteen precious years were wasted in this mirage. Originally as the bo ok was composed all the Sanskrit text "matter" was in Devanagari and also transliterat ed in Roman following the International standard uniform code. One of the main reasons of my trying so very hard to get the book published in Indi a was to keep the price within the limits of the budgets of Indian libraries, who may be the major buyers. The prices of goods and wages are so high in America that those w ho have never been here can never realize it in full. Yet I was left with no choice. Th e book is now produced in America, the country of trees showering dollars. Even if the book is distributed at cost price, an average Indian library may find it difficult to buy it . And how will they realize its value? No bookseller would like to promote its sale. It won't bring lucrative commission and means to persuade the librarians. We have had a very sad experience with TULIP. Libraries all over the world have acquired it, but n ot even a single library in India found it worthy to give it a place on its shelve! How s ad!! The greatest problem still to be tackled was the provision of diacritical marks. Until about six months ago I could not even dream that the modern computer technology, as it was available to me here in Columbia with no active studies, reading, writing, and r esearch in Sanskrit would enable me to insert all the diacritical marks. However, it did , thanks a million to Mr. Greg Johnson of the Computing Services of the University of Missouri at Columbia. But all the Sanskrit matter in Devanagari had to be eliminated. It could not be composed here. It is presented only in transliterated form. This book is then a product of the latest developments in the field of computer techn ology. If there was ever a case of "from pillar to post," this was it. I don't think it is a perfect production. There are many flaws. My knowledge of Sanskrit has now recede d into the background. It does not have the same sharp focus. Yet I decided to bring t he work out as it is. Until the world of Sanskrit learning finds a dedicated selfless scholar who possesses all the knowledge which has been an instrument here, plus all that is still lacking, the r eader can stay with this publication. The reader will observe that a great deal of stealing has been committed by some "s cholars" from my previous work on BilhaÆa, whose plagiarism has been criticized by me. Yet I give full freedom to any Sanskrit pandit to edit this work, revise it and publi sh it. There is no copyright! 6 Vi≈van¡tha ˛¡str• Bh¡radv¡ja, I think, is no more there to see his criticism. But Misr a will certainly see. I don't think it will serve any useful purpose. He has already reac hed the top of the Mount Everest. He cannot go any higher. But he will certainly come down in the eyes of those who have been misled by him. So a copy will be sent to Tüb ingen. Some very serious literary charges have been levelled in this study against Mr. B. N . Misra and his so-called gurus at Tübingen, if there were any. We request an inquiry. We cannot believe a German University, much less Tübingen, could award a Ph.D. de gree on what is presented by Misra in his book. The University owes an explanation. If they cannot justify the award of a Ph.D., they owe a word of apology to the Sanskrit World of Learning. This unscholarly writing cannot be allowed to go unchallenged. T his has been an objective of writing this book. With these short notes I conclude my Úmukham. I need not repeat all that has been stated throughout the book. SatyamSatyam evaeva jayate.jayate.