10. Puṣpadūṣitaka in Kuntaka’s treatment

Among the lost dramas, Kuntaka cites Puṣpadūṣitaka as instance for his final varieties like contextual and compositional figurativeness. Some brief information of it is available from the citation of Kuntaka. Moreover the citations of other rhetoricians like Abhinavagupta, Rāmacandra Guṇcandra etc. signifies the literary merit of this drama. Puṣpadūṣitaka is a lost six act Jain drama written in Sanskrit by one Brahmayaśas or Brahmayaśasvāmin. This is a story of Samudradatta and Nandayantī.

In the first act, Sāgaradatta, father of Samudradatta happens to hear a rumour about the virtue of Nandayantī, while his husband is abroad. In the second act Samudradatta secretly visits his wife Nandayantī by giving his ring as a bribe to the guard. Due to the unavailability of the complete text it is not clear about the reason of the secrecy of Samudradatta’s visit with his own wife. In the third act the father in law has driven Nandayantī to the forest hearing her gathering with a stranger. Then in the fourth act from the guard Kuvalaya, who has been away from Sāgaradatta, shows the ring he had as a bribe. Sāgaradatta fills with great remorse by realizing his son’s ring. He curses himself of his cruel banishment of Nandayantī, the daughter of Vijayadatta in her advanced pregnancy. Kuntaka cites the interrelation between the ring episode of second and fourth act as an instance of contextual figurativeness. In the fifth act Kuvalya conveys Nandayantī about the welfare of his husband Samudradatta. The final act ends with the reunion of husband and wife in a dramatic way.

Apart from the lost dramas mentioned in these two varieties of compositional figurativeness, Kuntaka also cites some other minor plays in some other situations. Information about some other Rāma plays quoted by Kuntaka for different contexts is given below. They are Rāghavānanda, Abhijñānajānaki and Mahānāṭaka.