The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c7.s6.49

v1.c7.s6.49

Sir John Marshall identified the Kāsīputra of this record with the fifth Śuṅga king, variously termed Bhadraka, Ārdraka and Odruka, Andhraka and Antaka in the Bhāgavata, Viṣṇu, Vāyu, and Matsya Purāṇas respectively.³ Mr. Jayaswal and Prof. Rapson have taken him for the penultimate Śuṅga king, Bhāga or Bhāgavata of the Purāṇas.⁴ Mr. H. C. Raychaudhuri believes that ‘the view of Marshall seems to be the more probable’.¹ He argued that the ‘discovery of another Besnagar Garuḍa pillar inscription (of the twelfth year after the installation of Mahārāja Bhāgavata) . . . proves that there was at Vidiśā a king named Bhāgavata to be distinguished from king Kāsīputra Bhāgabhadra’.