The Ancientness of Hastinapur

India is an amazingly prosperous country because greatmen, born here, have always bestowed valuable treasures upon the world by their austerity, penance and literary writing. In other words, we can also say-`India is the cradle of greatmen’. There are a number of sacred cities like Ayodhya, Hastinapur, Varanasi, Ujjain etc. which were established by Indra, crores of years back. Ancient history and Ved-Purans state that this country has been named as ‘Bharat Varsha’ on the name of the eldest son of Tirthankar Rishabhdev i.e. the first Chakravarti (Monarch)-Emperor Bharat.

Three out of 24 Tirthankars of Jainism i.e. 16th Tirthankar Shri Shantinath, 17th Tirthankar Shri Kunthunath and 18th Tirthankar Shri Arahnath were born at Hastinapur. Crores of years back, four Kalyanakas (Auspicious life events) of each of these three Tirthankars occurred at this land and all of them, having the ranks of Tirthankar, Chakravarti and Kamdev each, ruled over the six Khandas (divisions) of the earth by making Hastinapur their capital city. Hastinapur was considered as the capital of India even in the times of Mahabharat, about 86500 years back. At that time, Delhi and Hastinapur were probably considered to be the same. As Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru has quoted on page 107 of his book ‘The Discovery of India’–``Dilli or Delhi, not the modern city but ancient cities situated near the modern site, named Hastinapur and Indraprastha becomes the metropolis of India.” It clearly mentions that the capital city ‘Delhi’ of today was called as Hastinapur and Indraprastha in previous times, so Delhi and Hastinapur should be considered as complementary to each other.

It clearly mentions that the capital city ‘Delhi’ of today was called as Hastinapur and Indraprastha in previous times, so Delhi and Hastinapur should be considered as complementary to each other.