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Anthropological Study on Kalinga Sri Lanka Relationship

Asutosh Mishra

The island country, Sri Lanka, famously known as the pearl of the Indian Ocean and the soul of India that is Odisha otherwise known as the temple city of India had a very ancient connection. History has been saying that the founder of the Sinhalese race was an Odia (Kalinga) as mentioned in Mahavamsa, the greatest literature of Sri Lanka. Recent genetic studies have confirmed that the ancestors of Sri Lankans were from Odisha. Kalinga, the ancient Odisha, had a strong relationship with Ceylon (Sri Lanka) that flourished for 1700 years. Matrimonial tie was the main reason for this relationship to sustain so long. It was Kalinga that had popularised Buddhism in the island. It had even introduced Vajrayana Buddhism to the people of the island. The famous Abhayagiri monastery of Sri Lanka has a deep connection with Kalinga. Both of them used to share an identical culture that most of the scholars hasn’t pointed out. Kalinga had influenced Sri Lanka in many ways and it can be seen through the similarities they both still carry.