Face To Face With Truth - Contributed by Raghunath Reddy

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Face To Face With Truth

 

MY FIRST VISIT TO SHIRDI- A DIVINE EXPERIENCE

 

Om Sri Sainathaya Nama

 

Sai Baba often said, that let my man be at any

distance, a thousand kos away from me, he will be

drawn to Shirdi, like a sparrow, with a thread, tied

to its feet. It proved in our case more emphatically

as we were dragged to Shirdi forcibly.

 

When I was a 12 year old, studying in the 8th standard

in Nellore a district capital town in AP, India, I

started visiting an old Sai Temple very regularly

situated close to my house. I didn't know anything in

detail about Shri Sai till we were pulled to Shirdi in

1992. A visit to Sai mandir was like a visit to any

other mandir. My uncle who has been an ardent Sai

devotee brought the small black and white photo of Sai

Baba way back in 1950s and the same is still there in

our ancestral place in the village. My grandmother who

was another sincere devotee of Sai used to bring a jug

full of coconut water from Sai Mandir every Thursday

during mid 70s. For about 5-6 years every Thursday I

was getting Sai's Prasad in the form of coconut water

regularly.

 

Some time in June 1992, when I visited Nellore,a

friend of mine advised me to do Sai Satcharitra

parayan and keep a picture of Sai in pooja mandir.

He took me to the temple and got a nice Baba's

ashirvad picture, and then he tried to get Satcharitra

but couldn't find one. As a last resort he said, that

atleast he would borrow one from the library and give

it to me, so that after parayan the book could be

returned. Even that he failed to do. As Sai decided to

present that Holy book, a small miracle happened, a

few minutes before my departure. One of my friend's

friend, was there accidently and my friend told him

about how he tried to get Satcharitra for me which

ended in vain. Then in a flash he left for his place

and returned with a copy of brand new Sai Satcharitra.

He told me to keep the book with me and wanted me to

buy a few copies when I visit Shirdi and distribute

them to people. I left for Tirupati, the place where I

have settled down since 1988 with that beautiful

picture of Sai and a copy of Sai Satcharitra.

 

My wife was extremely pleased to keep that beautiful

picture of Sai in our pooja mandir immediately. The

very next month another close friend of mine was

leaving for Gaborone to settle down there as a

Financial Consultant. He wanted to visit Shirdi with

all his family members as he was leaving India once

for all. He invited us to join him for that Shirdi

visit. I was actually in no position to visit Shirdi.

Apart from my official work I was pressed with other

pre occupations. I just couldn't oblige him. But he

insisted that I should visit at any cost. At last I

told him to take my wife and 4 year old son, along

with them. He refused and told me very firmly that we

should accompany him to Shirdi. I was in a fix but he

went ahead to make arrangements. At last I had to bow

to his wish and all of us left for Shirdi.

 

The day we stepped on the holy soil of Shirdi, turned

out to be Gurupoornima. It was a Thursday and Shirdi

wore that festive look. It was virtually infested with

large number of devotees. The whole temple was

marvelously decorated and one could feel that divine

energy emanating from the Samadhi Mandir. Truly it was

a remarkable spectacle indeed. Baba's pallaki seva was

in progress when we entered the temple. The whole

place was reverberating with the sounds of drum beats

and other instruments. It was a frenziedatmosphere as

devotees kept shouting " victory to Shri Sainath

Maharaj " . We have experienced such divine joy which we

have not tasted before at other places. After darshan

we returned to the guest house where we were

accommodated.

 

At the stroke of midnight, while all others, were fast

asleep I got up and took bath and proceeded to Samadhi

Mandir. The mandir was kept open as it was the day of

Gurupoornima.I went inside and sat opposite the statue

of Sri Sai. Some of the devotees were doing parikrama

of the Samadhi. This was a sort of privilege for the

devotees on three days a year Sri Ramanavami,

Gurupoornima and Vijayadashmi only Samadhi mandir

would be kept open through out the night and devotees

could go round the Samadhi (parikrama). Now due to

ever surging crowds to Shirdi this practice is done

away with. So I was in a way fortunate to remain

inside the mandir till 5 A.M. I sat gazing at the idol

of Shri Sai and was shedding tears unknowingly. Baba

had melted my heart and it was a kind of unknown joy

that I hadn't experienced before. After spending about

two hours in this fashion I started doing parikrama

(pradikshina) of Samadhi. I did it for another two

hours and left the mandir in a divine intoxicated

state. Immediately I did parikrama at Gurusthan.

 

After the dawn I told my friend and others what

happened the previous night. My friend wanted to spend

time in the mandir the next day but the mandir was

closed. Those days all the poor devotees and people

from nearby villages used to sleep on hired beds which

were spread in the open area around Samadhi mandir. We

wanted to be amidst those common people and decided to

spend the night there instead of staying in the guest

house. Both my friend and I took two beds paying Rs. 4

and lay down in the open area. There were lot of

innocent villagers and beggers around. It just

reminded us of those days of Shri Sai when He was

surrounded by such innocent folk all around. It was

another pleasant experience that Shri Sai provided us.

 

 

After spending three fruitful days at Shirdi we were

returning to Tirupati. There were old people and young

children in our group and all of us comfortably,

without any problem spent the time there savouring the

divine grace of Sai. On the final day we were to catch

Dadar express at Daund station. As per the railway

time it was 19-30 hours, which meant 7-30 PM. But both

my friend and I mistook it as 9-30 PM in the night. We

left Shirdi thinking that we should reach Daund around

8-30 PM so that we could finish our dinner and board

the train.

 

We reached Ahmad Nagar around 4 p.m. and just missed

the 4 p.m. bus to Daund. The next bus was at 6 p.m. As

the journey time was two and half hours from Nagar to

Daund we thought it would be okay. In the mean while,

some of us started enquiring whether there were any

other modes of transport. The transporters quoted

three times more than the bus fare. We didn't want to

go by the car as it was expensive. Suddenly one person

approached us on his own and said that he had a van

and he would take all of us to Daund. He demanded

exactly the bus fare. It sounded good to us and the

van was so huge that all the 21 members could be

accommodated comfortably. He was driving it at great

speed. It was a frightening sight. In between we

wanted him to stop at a couple of places, but he

proceeded straight. We were wondering as to what was

happening. He took us straight to the station and it

was 7-35 PM. One of the members, in our group, didn't

have the ticket so my friend told me to settle the van

bill while he proceeded straight to the ticket

counter. When he asked for the ticket, he was told

that the train was already there on the platform and

was about to leave. He panicked as we were there on

the other side. We had to cross a huge overbridge

covering so many tracks. He was shouting while running

towards us. Since there were old and small children we

couldn't walk so hastily. There was darkness all

around and how we covered the bridge with kids and

luggage was a mystery. Though we took our own time to

reach the platform, the train didn't budge even an

inch. We had time to accommodate ourselves in our

compartment and soon the train left the station.

 

All of us were moved by this incident. If not for the

divine play of Sainath, we would have been left

stranded at the station. It would certainly have been

a horrible sight had we missed the train! All the

money was exhausted and reservations would be one

problem and on top spending the night at the station

with kids and old people, it was unimaginable. We

could visualize that, the person who dropped us at the

station, was none other than Sri Sai who wanted to

avert such an inconvenience to His Children. All of us

gave up dinner that night. Baba filled our heart with

his divine leela.

 

After this visit, Shri Sai has become an inseparable

part of our lives. With every visit to Shirdi we

started experiencing more and more of his divine

leelas. As one thinks of Him in right earnest, so He

manifests to guide and show the right path to His

devotees.

 

Om Sri Sai Ram

Bow to Shri Sai and peace be to all.

 

By Raghunath Reddy