Akshobhya Tirtha
Akshobhya Tirtha was a Dvaita scholar and theologian. A forceful debater of his time, he is considered to be the contemporary of Vidyaranya and Vedanta Desika, flourishing in the nascent Vijayanagara Empire. Born as Govinda Shastri, he received sannyasa from Madhva and later succeeded Madhava Tirtha as the pontiff of the Madhvacharya peetha from. Traditionally, Akshobhya is known to have triumphed over Vidyaranya in a debate, the arbiter of which was Vedanta Desika. A non-extant work titled Madhva Tantra Samgraha is attributed to him. Sharma contends that Akshobhya retired to Pandharapur in his twilight years where he encountered a youth called Dhondu Pant on the banks of Bhima river, who would later go on to be his disciple and successor, Jayatirtha. His mortal remains rest at Malkhed.
