After donating life earnings worth over Rs 200 crore, Ahmedabad businessman and wife set to take monkhood pledge

The Jain couple will take the pledge with 33 others from the community at the Sabarmati Riverfront in Ahmedabad on April 22 at an elaborate diksha ceremony. Among the 35 mumukshus, who will renounce all worldly pleasures to seek liberation, 10 are below 18.

Bhavesh Bhandari and his wife Jinal (right) will take the monkhood pledge on April 22. (Express File Photo)

An Ahmedabad businessman has donated his life earnings worth over Rs 200 crore as he and his wife are set to adopt monkhood next week. Inspired by their children to “walk on the path of renunciation and salvation”, Bhavesh Bhandari and his wife Jinal Bhandari say the decision was not easy. “It was hard for me to convince my parents to give me the permission to take the pledge of monkhood. ‘It is too early, take some more time,’ they told me. But I remained firm. Now, my father and my elder brother will take care of the business. I have decided to choose the right path for living, and for that I have selected monkhood. I have lived a lavish life and have not faced any difficulties… not even in my business. I am happy with the decision,” Bhavesh Bhandari told The Indian Express on Monday.

The Jain couple will take the pledge with 33 others from the community at the Sabarmati Riverfront in Ahmedabad on April 22 at an elaborate diksha ceremony. Among the 35 mumukshus, who will renounce all worldly pleasures to seek liberation, 10 are below 18.

On Monday, the couple led a procession in Sabarkantha as they donated all their belongings.

VIDEO | Gujarat-based businessman Bhavesh Bhandari and his wife donated their lifetime earnings of over Rs 200 crore to adopt monkhood. The couple led a procession in Sabarkantha, Gujarat, yesterday as they donated all their belongings.

(Full video available on PTI Videos -… pic.twitter.com/eWu9IQEZo3

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Bhandari is a real estate businessman. In 2022, his 19-year-old daughter and 16-year-old son adopted monkhood at one such event in Surat under the guidance of Acharya Dev Vijay Yog Tilak Suriji Maharaj. According to the Bhandari family, they have been following the teachings of the spiritual leader for nearly 10 years. Earlier too, the businessman has donated for community and diksha events organised in different parts of Gujarat.

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“We have a family business. We mainly deal with finance and land developers. We deal with business finance, auto finance and other finances run by the name of Simandhar Finance. pursued BBA (Bachelors of Business Administration) and later joined our family business. I am the proprietor of the company and my father Girish Bhandari and my elder brother Riddhish Bhandari, are also taking care of the business.”

Apart from the Bhandari family, others who will take pledge of monkhood from Acharya Yogtilaksuriji Maharaj at the event are Sanjaybhai Sadariya, a textile trader based in Surat, and his wife Binaben. The couple’s son and daughter had taken diksha in 2021.

Now after the monkhood pledge, the whole family will reside in a different Upashray (religious resting place of a Jain priest).

Jashvant Shah, another Surat-based textile trader, and his wife Dipika will also take diksha (pledge of monhood), walking on the footsteps of their sons who took the pledge a year ago.

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One more couple from Surat — Jagdish Shah and his wife Shilpa — will take diksha while their only son took the pledge in 2021.

The five-day dikha event will start on April 18, and is expected to see a gathering of thousands from the Jain community from India and abroad. The grand ceremony will be held at Sabarmati Riverfront. The main pavilion at the venue will have seating arrangements of 30,000 people. In the night, over 2,000 lamps will light up the place, according to people in the know.

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