Efficacy of Sai Grace by K. Navin Chand

[Guest guest]

The worse was, however, still in the coming suffering from diabetes for two

decades with daily pokes of insulin and a strict, austere diet, he developed

gangrene of the foot in most pathetic circumstances. He was admitted into

hospital but despite the best of care it grew worse and spread to the entire

area below the knee. Much against his wishes, the affected portion was

amputated. This was a fatal decision which precipitated his end. The puss

reappeared after a few days and all types of complications like

thrombi-phlebitis, Uremia, Septicemia started. His last days were a

miserable sight, with blood transfusions, intravenous feeding of glucose and

saline bottles, and insertion of catheter tubes for-emptying urine and

hourly pokes of injections, all done simultaneously. He went into a coma for

13 days. During his last days lasting four months in hospitals, he was

constantly remembering Shri Sai Baba. My mother, Smt. K. Sunandanamma,

herself a staunch devotee, wept bitter tears night and day before Baba's

photo, pleading for His mercy and did several austerities. They were of no

avail. Just before the final moments my brother, Shri K. Bhakthavatsala Rao

while attending on my father in the night felt drowsy. When he opened his

eyes a little later he saw an old man, the exact likeness of Shri Sai Baba,

serenely sitting on a stool and looking intently at my father's face. My

brother, a maverick by attitude, was pleasantly surprised at the sight; but

he does not know when he sank into drowsiness again. When he re-opened his

eyes he saw my father going into severe convulsions. Minutes later his end

came when a quantity of phlegm coming into his mouth could not be vomited

out. Our urgent efforts failed as it went back and closed his respiratory

system. It was 12.30 midnight of 8/9 April 1963 Chaitra Purnima and Hanuman

Jayanthi day--a divine tribute to a man who celebrated Hanuman Jayanthi

every year. He went in the company of saints as his death closely followed

that of Swami Ramdas of Anand Ashram and Swami Shivananda Saraswati of

Rishikesh.

 

Looking back, I feel that Shri Sai Baba did not desert my father at any

time. Though he faced a cruel fate all through life, Shri Sai Baba in His

wisdom reserved His devotee the greatest gift of Moksha. An example can be

had from the sacred chapters of Shri Sai Satcharita itself Mhalasapati, His

earliest and most close devotee, was not helped material despite his extreme

poverty, Shri Sai Baba actually forbade his from accepting gifts of money.

Obviously He reserved t highest gift for him. Similarly, Lord Krishna

physically work against the mundane interests of Kama of Mahabharata through

his life but helped him with deliverance when he die manfully on the

battlefield against all cruel odds.

 

Every person has a carry over of self-imposed Karma injunctions

from previous births in varying degrees. It is closed back

to the mortal eye. Only the Kundalini inside man and a God-realised

Soul, a 'Sarvaantaryami, who can see it and prescribe what is best to each

man. Spiritual austeritie done with the right attitude of sincerity, alone

are the infallible antidote for the exacting processes of Karmic actions.

Else has to undergo sufferings till the account is closed. The ardent

devotees, if they face sufferings and disappointments, should not

blame Shri Sai Baba. Highest good comes only when face difficulties. My

father literally walked on the proverbial razor karmic edge all through his

life; but nevertheless he realised one big ambition though posthumously

and today we are all happy positions as Surgeons, Physicians, Engineers

and Lecturers. The tragedy of his life, however, was all the

more poking because he did not enjoy anything out of our bands. He

went without a debt of Karma to anybody. By his supreme sacrifice my

father consecrated himself to get the ultimate gift of life from the

ever-benevolent Shri Sai who Himself graced to come down to receive my

father personally and to take him by the Celestial Chariot to give him a

royal welcome at the portals His heavenly abode. It is an

inexorable axiom which Shri devotees should know is that His Grace is

always available abundance but it is only our holy which is not big

enough receive it. One should always try to enlarge it!

K. Navin Chand

Hyderabad

 

Source Shri Sai Leela Magazine June 1982)