Stories by Arpit

BACKGROUND Religions across the world have always revered the birthplaces of their divine figures with great respect. These places were soon transformed into pilgrimages, in view of the holy aura preserved in the respective birthplaces. Similarly, Jains have also revered the places where the five divine events, i.e. the Panchkalyanaks of Tirthankars (Chyavan, Janma, Diksha, Kevalgyan and Nirvan) had taken place. The last Tirthankar of this cosmic cycle, Shri Vardhaman Mahavir , on whose teachings Jainism has survived, flourished and thrived till date, was born in 599 BC , i.e. nearly 2,618 years ago. Being the last Tirthankar, it would be obvious to assume that all the original locations of Lord Mahavir’s Panchkalyanaks would have been well preserved by Jains; However, the case is not so. Although, it might be surprising, the locations of all the five Kalyanaks of Lord Mahavir are disputed – either between the Shwetambar-Digambar sects or by history scholars. The only Kal

Braving the untimely torrential rains, we were on our way from Chennai to the town of Puzhal which is home to the most ancient and beautiful idol of Lord Adinath in Southern India ; popularly known as Kesarwadi Jain Tirth . My gurudev, Param Pujya Muniraj Shri Shilchandravijayji Maharaja had highly recommended us to make a pilgrimage to this Tirth as the beauty of the idol had mesmerized him to say the least. Therefore, after loading ourselves in an auto-rickshaw, we headed off from Sowcarpet (Chennai), on 30th November 2019 to experience this divinity.  Before the the tirth was suggested by my gurudev, I had heard a lot about the divinity of the idol from various other books; therefore I was really keen to visit this Tirth and get a glimpse of the beautiful idol of the Lord. After a drive of nearly an hour on the Grand Northern trunk road, braving the torrential rainfall and maddening traffic, we reached the sleepy town of Puzhal post sunset.  Ancient temple of Lord A