BUDDHA AND JAYDEV-BOTH ARE ORIYAS BY BIRTH

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Bhubaneswar, Nov.13, 03

Like us in orissamatters.com, truth seekers elsewhere also find that both Lord Buddha and Sri Jaydev are Oriyas by birth. Eminent scholars of West Bengal Prof. Satyakam Sengupta and Ashis Kumar Chakroverty, have made this point clear on the basis of their respective research results.

Pointing out that Lord Buddha’s teachings were in Pali, Prof. Sengupta said that this was the language only of Orissa, not of Nepal. Because Buddha was an Oriya by birth, he taught in Pali, he underlined. He further observed that Buddha is traditionally worshipped, only in Orissa, as Lord Jagannath, but he is not worshipped even as a major deity in Nepal. Chakrovarty added, the ever increasing discovery of edicts and Stupas of Buddhistic origin in and around Bhubaneswar and in the golden triangle of Orissa bears the matchless evidence of Buddha being born in the land now known as Orissa. No where in India and specifically in Nepal such enormous proof of Buddhist connection with the land is located. Had Buddha not been born in Orissa, it would never have been the abode of such vast Buddhist sites, he said.

Both the noted scholars systematically razed down also the propaganda that Jaydev belonged to Bengal. The words used by Sri Jaydev are phonetically nearer to Oriya language than to Bengali, they said. Themewise also his songs reflect the philosophy then in vogue in Orissa alone, they observed. In strong disapproval of those who have been trying to link Jaydev’s birthplace to a place called Kenduli on the embankment of river Ajay in West Bengal, Prof. Sengupta cited historical documents to show that there was no such village on such an embankment at the time of the poet. The spiritual philosophy that found expression in the songs of Sri Jaydev had no existence in Bengal. The propaganda that Jaydev was a court poet of King Laxmansen is absolutely ridiculous as the poet preceded this particular king by at least a century. The love cult of Radha and Krishna sic passim in Jaydev’s work entered into Bengal only after Sri Chaitanya and his Bengali companions came in contact with Gita Govinda in Orissa, they said. In Bengal’s religious heritage, Radha-Krishna worship is a later phenomenon traceable only in the post Chaitanya phase whereas this love-cult was so well settled in Orissa that it would not be an exaggeration to say that it had shaped major part of the Orissan temple architecture. The first ever commentary on Gita Govind not only took shape in Orissa, most of its imitations also enriched the literature of this part of the globe. Nowhere in India so vast number of manuscripts of this popular work has been found. All literary evidence lead to the truth that Sri Jaydev was an Oriya by birth, they emphasized.

Both Prof.Sengupta and Chakroverty have enriched the ongoing research on both these great sons of Orissa, while expressing their views in a seminar. It was organised to dwell on the controversy over birthplaces of these two epoch makers. The seminar was hosted by Eastern Zonal Cultural Center, Kolkata and the Utkal University of Culture, Bhubaneswar on November 11 and 12.