INTRODUCTION Again, in the long discussion on the calculation of the apparent position of celestial bodies ( ABh., Kala., 17-21 ), speaking on a method to derive the sakrt-karna, our author says : 3T?*refa (TSS 110, p. 47) This would indicate the intimacy that existed between Niiakantha and his patron and the common interest that bound them together. On the compilation of the ABh.Bhasya, Niiakantha observes in one place :
- j?*mre %<*ife5T ^i*ri eratfiT: srfaqra ^Wtaf^TT snOT'T ^R^THs^
3*nsJ?H *flTfT?TO, 3?cI^T^m fo*s*Tf* I (TSS 101, p. 113). Again, at another context, he remarks : r?t% ^ET^fW 3Rf*TT%*T finffcreirfa foKta ^WrTf^T ^TfTcW I cTftRiT g?r: snWTSTOTOEW I (T^S 101, p. 156). It is clear from the above that the credit of enthusing Niiakantha in his investigations, and, in fact, to have prompted him to write his ABh.Bhasya., goes to Netranarayana, 1 the members of whose family are known all through the annals of Kerala history to have been good scholars and, at the same time, patrons of scholarship. Ravi and Damodara, the Teachers Niiakantha informs us in his ABh.Bhasya that he studied Vedanta under Ravi, cf. Ravita atta-Vedanta-'sastrena, (TSS 101, p. 180). That Ravi was well versed also in jyotissastra and that Niiakantha imbibed some of his knowledge in astronomy from Ravi is clear from the introductory verse to Nllakantha's Siddhantadarpana, where Ravi, his teacher, has been mentioned by double entendre : 1. Even with regard to Nllakantha's Tantwsahgraha, its introductory verse, has a veiled reference to his patron (Netra)-Narayana at whose instance that work too seems to have been written.
