Meru Temples of Angkor - A New Historical Perspective

Five Meru Temples and 52 towered temples of Angkor Thom in Cambodia are basically dedicated to Jain religion. Author fully convinced about his surmise, the historical and geographical facts, produced in the book justify his belief.

DR. JINESHWAR DAS JAIN

Date of Birth: 7th Feb., 1935

Birth Place Jaipur

Qualifications:

B.Sc., D.M.I.I. (Electronics) Dr. Eng. (Germany)

Joined Central Electronics Engineering Research Institute, Pilani (Raj.) India Dec., 1957 and took voluntary retirement as Senior Assistant Director (Sc. E2) in Dec. 1990. Research Engineer from Jan. 1991 to Jan. 1994 in Material Research Laboratory, Govt. of Libya. Member Indian Standards Institution. : Fellow Member: IETE, New Delhi. Life Fellow Acoustical Society of India, Hyderabad. Languages Known: Hindi, English, Sanskrit, Prakrit, German, French, Arabic.

Countries Visited: England, France, Holland, Denmark, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Luxemberg, U.S.S.R, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary, Jugoslavia, United States of America, Canada, United Arab Emirates, Libya, Malla, Bahrain, Combodia..

He completed his education from Bombay, Osmania and Anamalai University. He studied Jainism in the keen observation of great Jain scholar monk Shri Sahajanand Varni, who was his spiritual teacher also. He is a renowned educationist and journalist. He has contributed more than 500 research articles published in reputed journals. He also compiled. & edited many books on Indology. He is founder editor of 'Sahaj Anand', 'Nan Sayar' and 'Aapki Samasya-Hamara, Samadhan'. Presently, he is the chairman of Sahajanand Institute for Perfection, an organisation associated with research work on Ancient Indian Sciences.

For the first time when I happened to read an article on Angkor temples in National Geographic May 1982 by Peter J. White. I had envisaged that these temples are basically dedicated to Jain religion because the Five Meru Temples and 52 towered temple of Angkor Thom have importance in Jaina Philosophy only. I felt that the westerner Historians and Geographers are not aware much about Jaina religion, History and Geography. Keeping this in view I have tried to incorporate in this book some of the historical and geographical facts according to Jaina literature.

I travelled to Cambodia and visited Angkor temples and am fully convinced about my surmise. I would like to pay my respect to Acharya Shri Vidhya Nandji Maharaj and Acharya Shri Vidhya Sagarji Maharaj with whose blessings I have been successful in my mission. I am further thankful to Dr. Jagatpati Joshi, Retired Director General, Archeological Survey of India who informed me about the availability of detailed information on these temples in French Institute of Oriental studies,Pondichery and also for his useful discussions on this subject. I am highly obliged to Shri Ashok Jain of Arihant International for publishing this book in a very short time.

**Contents and Sample Pages**