Aum Sri Sai Ram
Precious Memories
This Easter Sunday, April 24th, 2011 marked the end of a glorious
chapter in human history. For, it was on this auspicious day early
in the morning at 7.40 a.m. that Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba,
God-incarnate for this Kali age gave up His physical form and merged
back into Divine Enlightenment, engulfing the entire manifest world
into inconsolable grief. Every time I sat there looking at the
Divine body my mind kept going back to the late thirties and seeing
in front of me a tender school boy, in a poor village, who had only
one pair of shirt and shorts which he washed every evening to be
worn again next morning for the school.
If the shirts needed a stitch it was done by
putting in place a longish thorn across threads. A few years later
the same school boy was on the stage performing a marvelous dance
with no one in the overjoyed audience suspecting that it was not the
young girl dancer who was invited to put up the performance. Since
the noted dancer failed to show up little Sathya agreed to be the
substitute.
The tenderly built Sathyanarayana Raju grew up to declare at the
young age of 14 that He was God incarnate the Avatar of this Kali
Yuga who had assumed human form to spread the message of Love across
the world by undertaking incredible tasks which got completed with
perfection in all aspects. He taught humanity that it must rise from
religion to spirituality the common bottom line for all faiths.
Spirituality itself was declared to be nothing other than pure love
in action to serve humanity. For every human being had God as the
in-dweller.
There are three outstanding examples He has set
for us all, be they be involved in governments in power, business
houses social organizations of all kinds and above all, the common
individuals from all walks of life. Being all powerful God He could
have merely willed things to happen and there these would be. But,
to set there as examples of what human endeavor can accomplish He
toiled hard at the human level investing His time, physical effort,
meticulous planning, proper anticipation and above all His unlimited
wealth of Love in every venture He undertook. His divine effort went
in several directions.
The meticulous way Swami took care of all details,
howsoever, trivial these may have appeared to us, was to be
witnessed to be believed.
The third thought that came to me about the young school boy relates
to that historic date October 20, 1940 when at the tender age of 14
He threw away His books and left the home declaring that He had come
on a great mission for the welfare of humanity and His devotees were
waiting for Him. What happened over the seven decades step by step,
systematically and with unimaginable determination is now history
and universally known. Yet, it is tempting to recall some of the
developments.
The first of these has been healthcare which started as early as
1954 when Swami was merely 28 years old. It was in that year that
He, as a first priority, laid the foundation stone for a general
hospital in Puttaparthi. The only facility that existed then by way
of health care was a tiny poorly equipped government dispensary at
Bukkapatnum. The general hospital started functioning in 1957 and is
today taking care of over 500 patients belonging to the nearly
villages everyday. In particular over the recent years the hospital
has saved lakhs of lives of young women and newborn children by
providing timely and appropriate natal care.
Everything is totally free – complicated tests,
medicines, providing life saving drips, food and all that. Unlike
anywhere else there is no billing department.
This initial venture serving the poor villagers without any
restriction totally free has now grown into a massive system which
includes two super speciality hospitals two general
hospitals have come to be the last resort for poor people from all
parts of India and many from abroad. These facilities are equipped
with the latest devices and with competent doctors capable of
dealing with incredibly difficult problems. On top of all this is
the perfectly equipped mobile hospitals for villagers who do not
even have the time and resources to come over to Puttaparthi and a
mother and child health care van which is a boon for young women and
children.
The set of colleges inaugurated in the late sixties onwards have now
grown into a small but impressive university, with four campuses.
Wedded to a system of education which gives the highest priority to
the cultivation of human values this university has become a model
for universal replication. The fact that highest quality of academic
pursuits have gone hand in hand with imbibing the commitment of
service to society has earned it the highest rating from the UGC and
its evaluation agency NAAC. The largest privately built safe
drinking water projects, covering Anantapur, Medak and Kurnool
districts, tribal belts of East and West Godavari and Chennai city
are ones which no governments were able to undertake or even
consider undertaking seriously.
At the personal level, three recent experiences have frequently and
repeatedly flashed in my mind. First, relates to March 23, in Yajur
Mandir when Bhagawan was about to retire after dinner. All devotees
had an excellent darshan that evening. Since this happened to be a
day of special significance to me, I very much wished to have a word
with Swami.
I was also invited to a meeting of the
Research Advisory Committee of the Madras School of Economics on
Saturday, 26th March I wanted to take Swami’s blessing and
permission to attend before I confirmed my travel plans. I was thus
motivated to proceed towards Bhagawan who was about to be taken into
the elevator. Somehow, I was not able only to seek permission to
proceed to Chennai. He appeared to approve my proceeding to Chennai
but did not register properly, I felt. In any case, as I was about
to move back, Swami gestured to me to stay where I was and hinted to
the boys to bring the bowl containing Vibhuti packets. I was
overjoyed to be blessed with a few packets and moved back. That was
not all. Everyone present in the room was called one by one and
blessed with a few packets of Vibhuti. As they later tried to convey
their thanks to me for praying to Swami for Vibhti Prasadam I had to
clarify that it had come to all of us including me as a special
blessing, without my having requested for it. Little did we realize
that at the physical mortal level this was His last divine gift to
all of us.
The second experience I recall is what occurred on Friday, March
25th. At the end of a marvelous Darshan we all had that day we
walked with Bhagawan back to Yajur Mandir. When Swami was retiring I
thoughts of once again praying for His permission to proceed to
Chennai the next morning. As I stood close to Him in front of the
elevator I mentioned that I had to go to Chennai for a night for an
official meeting. He listened and enquired about the meeting and
about my return. He even held my hand with a good grip and I was
able to kiss the Divine Hands. He conveyed his blessings for the
trip unlike what had happened two days earlier. Since Swami did not
come down at all for the next two days, it is my feeling that my
interaction with Him on 25th March would have been the last with any
‘devotee’ leaving aside His personal attendants.
The third experience relates to Monday, March 28th. I was home
trying to sort out some papers when there seemed to be some
commotion along the road close to our room. My wife stepped out and
hurried back to say that an ambulance van had moved into Yajur
Mandir. Hearing this I got ready quickly and called Prof.
Venkataraman to say that Swami was likely to be taken to the Super
Speciality Hospital. Meanwhile as I stepped out I saw the ambulance
moving out of this area. Luckily, Prof. Venkataraman arrived shortly
and both of us drove in his car towards the SSSIHMS by the special
western gate. Since we could move fast and the ambulance was to move
slow, we were able to catch up with it fairly quickly and be there
when Bhagawan was being taken out of the ambulance, still on the
wheelchair. I was fairly close and in front when He was being taken
out. As He looked up I, and presumably some others with me, were
blessed with a beautiful smile which will remain a treasured memory
in my heart for ever.
PRECIOUS MEMORIES by Prof V N Pandit
|
