BIOLOGY IN JAINISM: A REVIEW

The history of science is not just a chronological description of events of scientific discovery but it is a story of an ongoing process of the interaction of science and society.It is a story of how socio-economic conditions of a given society necessitate particular inventions and innovations. These processes are neither time restricted nor space restricted. In the sense, they are of universal applied value. In this context, it is worth remembering that, the rich heritage of India, comprises science and technology too, though only few people are aware of this. However, only recently, since few decades, people are attempting to popularize the scientific facts hidden latent in ancient works which have been mostly written in either Sanskrit or Halegannada. The present paper attempts to disclose the various aspects of biology that have appeared in major works of JAINISM. Eight major works pertaining to Jainism basically were studied in depth to gather information relevant to biological sciences and complied to obtain a comprehensive report.