Koundinya was a great sage. He was a master of Vedic knowledge. He was a sage known beyond
Bharat. Ashraya was his wife. Nothing is
known about his children or more about his wife. He has come in the lineage of Parasurama. Koundinya came to prominence as a youth due to his mastery of the Vedas. He was a great devotee
of Lord Ganesha.
Later in life, Koundinya got appointed as a royal court scholar of King Suddhodana of the Sakyas in
Kapilavastu. There Kaundinya was the only scholar who unequivocally predicted upon the birth of
Prince Siddhartha (8th April 563 BCE to 370 BCE) that the prince would become an enlightened Gautama Buddha, and vowed to become his
disciple.
Koundinya and four colleagues followed Siddhartha in six years of ascetic practice, but abandoned
in disgust after Siddhartha gave up the practice of self-mortification.