The vital points of antiquity, history and religious affiliations of the Son Bhandar caves are found little discussed by the earlier writers like Cunningham, Beglar, Marshall, Stein and others, who are almost exclusively concerned with the identification of only Buddhist Monuments is referred to by the Chinese pilgrims. In neither of these two caves any traces of Buddhism had been or are still noticed, except for their possible identification based on the early Buddhist annals as mentioned by Beglar (As noted in table above with quotes from Fa-Hian).

Further the Vaibhara hill on the side of which they were excavated contains on its top, a number of ancient as well as modern Jain monuments. Hieun Tsang mentions that the naked heretics (i.e. the Jains) frequented the Rajgir hills, in his time, in large numbers. It is quite well known that Rajgir was as sacred to the Jains as to the Buddhists since their great leader Mahavira, also passed a good deal of his time at Rajgir for preaching his doctrines. It is therefore natural to expect Jain monuments at Rajgir.

It is besides well known that the Barabar caves were excavated for the non-Buddhistic sects like the Ajivikas and others by Mauryan emperors Asoka and Dasratha. Since the Son Bhandar cave, from the architectural point of view, falls into the group of Barabar caves there is every reason to believe that it was a work of either of the two Mauryan emperors carried out probably for the Jain monks. Unfortunately an inscription, if any, which may have recorded the fact is probably obliterated, and may possibly still be traced after a careful examination of the rocks.

That the Son Bhandar was a well-recognized Jain monument early in the 19th century is clear from what Buchanan says of it in his journal. It is equally significant that in this side of the valley practically no Buddhist monuments have so far been traced nor are they so shown located in the Buddhist texts and in the accounts of Chinese pilgrims. The Sonbhandar cave may thus be considered to be the earliest Jain monument at Rajgir datable probably to the 2nd or 3rd century BC.