Dear elders, sisters and
brothers,
My humble
pranams at the DIVINE LOTUS FEET. Today i wish to dedicate
a small work to HIM.
My father left
most precious property for me and let me tell you thats
the only thing i have given by him. Swami gave me
education and father gave me this book SREE GURU CHARITRA
by Acharya E.Bharadwaja. It is a work on compilation of
the avatars of Sree Dattatreya. The author had translated
this from the original marathi version. This particular
book has been my strength and support over the last 7
years since i got in 1997 from my father when i was in my
2nd year graduation. It is a book with 23 chapters and my
parents used to do PARAYANAM (read it in equivalent
proportions over a period of 7 days from Thursday to
Wednesday). I was also asked to do this as the family was
undergoing a turbulent financial crisis. I found it
difficult to read the book in the beginning, so daddy told
me to read one particula para in chapter-9 every day 11
times if i could not complete the book.
Being a human,
with my monkey-mind, i had been clinging to the book only
when i was in the deepest troubles, and soon after i over
came the problem, i again neglected the book. But SWAMI is
so loving that although i had been an oppurtunist, HE has
never left me alone. Always reminding that i have HIM in
times of need.
Many of you can
recollect i had mailed to u all in june about some
problems i had been undergoing and even attempted to
suicide twice but SWAMI has saved me. I had lost hope at a
point of time, but NAMASMARANA and SATSANG on this forum
has encouraged me to live on. Above all my dear mother in
India has always been praying for me.
Now coming to
the book, it was on July 2nd, 2004, i had AKHANDA BHAJAIN
(i.e, from the evening of 1st july - 2nd july evening).
Since i am alone and could not invite anybody else to the
bhajain owing to my situation, i had 4 audio casettes of
bhajains which i was playing and singing along
with music. The evening of 1st July went very well, there
was adequate power supply and the whole night was spent
well in singing, in the morning there was power cut and i
could not sing many bhajains on my own, therefore i
decided to stop bhajains and do the parayanam of this
book, and thereby read all the 23 chapters during the
day. At the time i was reading this book, a thought came
to me for the first time, "I must type the entire
book and make it available to everybody where all can have
access to it as the book is out of print since 1980s. And
this book is not available at book centres anymore. This
is my GURU DAKSHINA on this holy day to THE ETERNAL GURU"
That night
itself after i finished the bhajain and arathi was shown
in the evening, i began to work on this without any delay.
I completed 18 chapters in 6 days, but then all of a
sudden i was unable to sit on the book anymore. Something
or the other came up in my way to finish this book. Now i
wish to make it available in parts which will make it easy
for your reading.
Our Lord SAI is
the incarnation of SHIRDI BABA and SHIRDI BABA is an
incarnation of LORD DATTATREYA. To illustrate this with a
testimony, i wish to recollect an incident which occured
in the late 1980s. I was studying at Sri Sathya Sai Vidya
Vihar, Ooty. Ooty school was Swami's summer venue. Swami
used to visit the school regularly every year in
the summer. As per the practice, Swami always haulted for
refreshments of the devotees accompanying HIM at
the Mudumalai Wild Life Sanctuary on the way from
Bangalore to Ooty. During one such trip, Swami stood for a
photo session. As he stood there, the cool breeze blew and
Swami's robe was not in position owing to the
wind. Therefore Mrs.Ratanlal rushed to straighten Swami's
robe at his feet, but swami sighed her not to come near
HIM. Later when the photo was developed, SWAMI was seen as
DATTATREYA standing with a cow behind him. This was later
narrated to us children at the school by our Teachers.
Many of you
visiting Prashanti Nilayam regularly must be knowing
Mrs.Ratanlal who is very active in all the activities of
the SATHYA SAI ORGANIZATIONS.
Therefore today
i am mailing the INTRODUCTION of the book in another
seperate mail.
I thank our
beloved LORD to give me this oppurtunity.
Venkataratnam P.
+234-80-23111327