Vadhula Grhyagamavrttirahasyam of Narayana Misra

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The Vadilagrhyagamaovrttirahasyam of Narayana Misra is a versified commentary on the Vadilagrhyasitravrtti, which itself is a short commentary on the Vadilagrhyasitra. It deals with the basic rituals performed in religious rites related to Grhya and Smartakarma. The text mainly deals with Samskara, religious activities to be observed by the Brahmacarins, marriage rituals, the duties of the newly-wed couples and several other religious and domestic rituals. The last two chapters deal exclusively with Sraddhakarma and Rajodharma, respectively. It includes an elucidation of Gayatri-mantra according to Acarya Sarikara, the significance of Prana and Vyahrtis and the mode of worship of Lord Visnu and Siva with Purusasikta.

The significance of Vadilagrhyagamavrttirahasya is in not just what it contains but also in the fact that it refers to many unknown texts, such as Prayogaklrpti, Katha-Aranyaka, Vadhilagam and Vrata Sangraha.

Professor B.B Chaubey is an eminent Sanskritist and an authority on Vedic language, literature and culture. He was Professor-Director of Vishveshvaranand Vishwa Bandhu Institute of Sanskrit and Indological Studies, Panjab University, Hoshiarpur. He has served as Elected Sectional President of the All India Oriental Conference for Vedic Section, the All India Oriental Conference on the South-East Asian Studies, the All India Oriental Conference for Technical Sciences and Fine Arts, and the All India Oriental Conference on Manuscriptology. Professor Chaubey has received several State and national level honours and awards including the Himotkarsh Parishad’s National Integration Award in 2000 and the President's Award in 2004.

The National Mission for Manuscripts was launched in February 2003, by the Government of India under the Ministry of Tourism and Culture with the mandate of identifying, protecting and making accessible the manuscript heritage of India, believed to be the largest repository of hand-written manuscripts in the world. Found on materials such as birch, palm-leaf, handmade paper and cloth, in different languages and scripts, and spread throughout the country in different public and private repositories, these manuscripts are the precious reserve of Indian knowledge systems. They represent different areas of intellectual activity such as streams of science, philosophy, arts and culture.

While the National Mission for Manuscripts strives to promote and propagate interest in the "traditional" knowledge contained in manuscripts, it also aims to re-contextualize the approach to this knowledge so that it remains alive and vital to the present and future generations. In an effort to engage with Indian knowledge systems, the Mission seeks to publish rare and unpublished manuscripts through twinging out critical editions of important texts, supplemented with informative introduction, detailed analyses and commentaries. Titled Kriibodha, this series of publications is intended to generate academic and public interest in Indian systems of learning.

The first of the Series is being launched with the present publication, the Vadilagrhyagamavrttirahasya of Narayana Misra. It is a versified commentary on the Vadilagrhyasutravrtti, which itself is a short commentary on the Vadilagrhyasutra. The text is criticall not only for the wealth of information it contains on religious and domestic rites and rituals especially related to Grhya and Smartakarma, but its reference to other important texts such as Katha- Aranyaka, Vadhilagama and Vrta Sarhgraha which have so far not seen the light of day.

The text has been critically edited, with detailed introduction and indices by Professor Braj Bihari Chaubey, a Sanskritist and a well-known scholar on Vedic Studies.

In continuation of the Series, the Mission intends to follow this critical edition with other important texts on India's knowledge systems.

In 1975, I undertook a project of bringing out the critical editions of the texts belonging to the Vadhiila recension which were not known even by name at that time, and those which were known through catalogues were under wrong nomenclatures. Under this project the Vadhiila Srautasutra was published in 1993, Vadhula- smrti with Hindi translation in 2000, the Vadhila Anvakhyana in 2001, the Vadhula Yajnaprayascittam in 2001. They were all published from the Katyayan Vaidik Sahitya Prakashan, Hoshiarpur (Punjab) with detailed introductions and various Indices. The present edition is based on the three MSS deposited in — (i) the Government Oriental Manuscript Library, Madras, under MS No. 1239; (ii) the Oriental Research Institute and Manuscript Library, Trivandrum, under MS No. T 1072; and (iii) the Oriental Institute, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda under MS No. 3436. With the efforts of Dr Siniruddh Das of Madras University, I got a xerox copy of the MS from GOML, Madras in 1995. Since at that time I was busy with other projects, I could not start working immediately after procuring the MS. In 1998, when I joined as a Visiting Professor for one year (1.5.98 — 30.4.99) at Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati University, Ajmer on the request of Prof. P.L. Chaturvedi, the then Vice-Chancellor, sufficient time was at my disposal to devote on this project. started copying the MS which I had procured from Madras. I was able to accomplish the basecopy of the entire text within a year. In connection with delivering lectures at a workshop on Palaeography and Manuscriptology organized by Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts IGNCA), New Delhi in collaboration with the Oriental Research Institute and Manuscript Library, University of Kerala, Trivandrum, I visited the Institute and facts related to grhya rituals and sacraments would come to light. For example, no text available so far on grhya rituals, dealing with sacraments, gives in detail the complete procedure of the Samavartana, a ritual performed at the completion of the studentship, as this text does.

Now, I feel great pleasure in presenting this critical edition of the Vadhiulagrhyagamavrttirahasya for the first time in the hands of scholars for which they were anxiously waiting.

On this auspicious occasion, I take the opportunity to express my deep sense of gratitude to the Institutions, scholars and well-wishers who helped me in many ways in preparing and bringing out the critical edition of the Vadhilagrhyagamavrtti- rahasya. First of all I am thankful to the Directors/Librarians and other authorities of — (i) The Government Oriental Manuscript Library, Madras; (ii) The Oriental Research Institute and MSS Library, University of Kerala, Trivandrum; and (iii) The Oriental Research Institute, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, who very kindly supplied me the xerox copies of the Vadhula- grhyagamavrttirahasya and gave some necessary information about the text. I am thankful to my friends Dr T.N. Dharmadhikari, former Director, Vaidika Samsodhana Mandala, Pune, and Dr H.G. Ranade, former Professor in the Dictionary Department at Deccan College, Pune with whom I frequently discussed about many doubtful readings.