Anandakavyam - With The Commentary By Anandakavi

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It gives me great pleasure to present to the world of scholars this small book, namely, Anandakavyam of Anandakavi'edited for the first time on the basis of a codex unicum 'by Dr. S.Y. Wakankar, Deputy Director, Oriental Institute, The M.S. University of Baroda, as the M.S. University Oriental Series No. 19. It was serially published in the Journal of the Oriental Institute Vol. 45, 46, 49, 50 Nos. 3-4, 1-2, 3-4. The same is now being published in the form of a book.

We are thankful to the scholar editor Dr. S.Y. Wakankar for his sincere efforts in editing the rare work. We are thankful to Smt. Saswati Sen, Temp. Research Officer and Shri Milind Joshi, Temp. Research Assistant for their help and co-operation. We thank the University authorities for sanctioning the required grant for the Publication of the book. We also thank Shri P.N. Shrivastava, Manager, M.S. University Press and his co-operative staff for neat and quick publication of the book.

M. L. Wadekar

Offig. Director

Oriental Institute

Janmastami

7th September 2004

It is a well-known fact that the Culture or the Civilization of a Nation reflects in its Literature. In fact, the Literature is the Mirror of the society. The aspirations of a people, its development, its attitude towards life etc. get expressed through its writings. The Literature, however, is the standard stick with which the depth and height of nations is measured. That is the reason why special efforts were made in the past to retrieve the literature or so to say the literary compositions which seemed to have been lost. In foreign lands, such searches for unearthing the literature, especially, the Biblical literature, were undertaken and successfully carried to fruition. Consequently, in India also, some foreign scholars did this kind of spadework, after they realised the importance of the Sanskrit Language and the literature couched in it.

In British Rule, some scholars were specially deputed to search for Manuscripts. Dr. G. Buhler undertook such Tours in Search of Manuscripts and prepared his detailed Reports about the findings. In one of his Tours to Kashmir, Rajasthan and Central India during 1875-76 AD, he could lay his hands on some poems which were written by Kashmirian scholars or authors of uncertain date. One such important and rare work is the present one, viz. Anandakavya with his own commentary by Ananda himself. The Ms. of this work is deposited in the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, with its No. 108 of 1875-1876, BORI, D. Vol. XIII. Part I, No. 31.

DESCRIPTION OF THE MS:

The Anandakavya exists only in one Manuscript and is at the BORI. Its physical description could be given as under: Extent: 49 folios, 10-11 lines per page and 45-46 letters per line in the section of the commentary. The Ms. is a good example of Tripatha-writing with the Text in the middle and the commentary thereon is written above and below the Text. The characters are Devanagari of the Kashmiri-style, the hand writing being quite legible, clear and uniform, but, at times, the overwriting poses problems in properly deciphering the letters. The xerox-copy of this rare Ms. was provided to me by my friend, Dr. S.N Bhavsar of Pune, for which I am extremely grateful to him. It is very difficult to say anything definite about the age of the Ms., as no mention either of the date of composition or the date of the completion of the commentary i complete, to be found in the Ms. since it is incomplete and abruptly ends on folio 49% in the middle. The Ms. thus, is incomplete and at one place, viz. f, 46b, the entire not matter on f. 46a is repeated verbatim. and hence, the continuity of the portion after Mrdukomala, etc. is broken/lost. Therefore, the exposition is as the original folio must have been lost or misplaced and the f. 47a starts abruptly with the word....näkäkhyam It means that the scribe did not get the original intact, hence, the commentaty starts in the middle, Moreover, the present Ms, seems to be a copy of some other Ms. which is now lost-as the last line on f. 49 would suggest Atahparam yathaivavataritam tathaivantarbhutam. This clearly suggests that our Ms. is copied from some other source which might have been complete, containing all the 66 verses, as the author specifically mentions this number in the very beginning of this work in the words: Atiramaniyam sulalitapadam sadguṇalankararityanusyutam nitipracuram satsastiślokani baddham balasuvijñeyam kavyam racayatyanandanāmā kavih.

Our Ms. contains only 63 verses (including the many interpretations of the same main verse) and abruptly ends on f. 49a in the third interpretation of the 17th main verse. Since this is the only Ms. available, it is not possible to compare it with any other Ms. Hence, at many places, there are lacunae which could not be filled in, despite our best efforts.