True spiritual mastery is achieved through complete self-emptying and devotion.
"Becoming the sandals worn on the Master's feet"
Avatar Meher Baba Ki Jai
Gulmai Kaikhushru Irani
Called by Baba "my spiritual mother"; gave the land of Meherabad
Gulmai Irani was born in 1882 in Parel, Bombay. In December 1896 she married Kaikhushru Sarosh Irani, a prominent businessman and civic leader of Ahmednagar, and they had four children: Rustom, Adi, Piroja and Dolly. For years she was depressed and unhappy in her husband's joint-family household, where her religious devotion was ridiculed by her in-laws.
In August 1919 her younger sister Soonamasi and Soonamasi's husband Kaikhushru Masa persuaded her, after two weeks of pleading, to visit the Perfect Master Upasni Maharaj at Sakori. On entering his hut she was astonished to recognize him as the figure who had recently appeared to her in a vivid dream. That same day she met the young Merwan Seth (Meher Baba), who remarked how different his life would have been had she been his mother. Over the following years she visited Sakori often and endured severe tests there; Merwan assured her that by withstanding them she had become the first woman to be granted the grace of a Perfect Master such as Upasni Maharaj.
In 1921 at Sakori, Meher Baba told her that every Perfect Master has a spiritual mother and that she was his. Upasni Maharaj made it clear that she should defer to Meher Baba in all matters. That July, against the objections of orthodox relatives, she insisted that Upasni Maharaj himself open the family's new house, Sarosh Manzil, in Ahmednagar.
When Baba spoke in 1923 of moving to a village, Gulmai invited him to the family's property near Arangaon, outside Ahmednagar. That land became Meherabad, and she and her husband gave it to him. During the 1920s she and her son Adi often carried messages between Sakori and Meherabad. In May 1924, when Baba was about to leave Meherabad after a family quarrel, her tears moved him to stay, and he said he had stepped out of the car only because of Mother.
Gulmai supported the ashram from Khushru Quarters in Ahmednagar, sending supplies and coming daily to share the work of the women mandali; for a period she also lived with them on Meherabad Hill. Her sons Adi and Rustom served Baba for life, and in 1945 her husband, long respectful but distant, was finally drawn to Baba shortly before his death.
In August 1962, gravely ill with cancer and kidney disease, Gulmai was visited by Baba on the 9th; though nearly unconscious, she caressed his face and whispered his name. She died at midnight on 10 August 1962, calling out Baba's name. The next morning Baba himself attended her burial on Meherabad Hill, where she became the first person to be buried. It was the last time Meher Baba went to Meherabad. Meher Baba Travels gives her birth year as 1882; Lord Meher gives her age as 36 in 1919 and 78 at her death.
โYou will be like Babajan. ... It is a fact. You are like Babajan!
โ December 1920, at Gulmai's home in Ahmednagar. When she said she could never be on Hazrat Babajan's level, Baba pointed to her and repeated it emphatically to Babu Cyclewalla
โEvery Sadguru has a spiritual mother; Durgabai is Maharaj's. ... Likewise, you are my spiritual mother and Pilamai is my spiritual sister. I have a past link with both of you through many lifetimes.
โ January 1921, Sakori: Baba asked Gulmai to sit closer, saying, "Sit here, Mother. I have something I want you to understand."
โI see you in Adi's eyes. He is the frame, and you are the image inside.
โ 1922, Manzil-e-Meem, Bombay: after Gulmai admitted that she had wept before his photograph
โLook, the bulb is connected by a wire to the switch. I just press the button, and there is light. Similarly, when the Perfect Master presses the button, the spiritual mother will have illumination! Until then, remember, patience is required.
โ 1922, Manzil-e-Meem, Bombay: said to Gulmai with his hand on a light switch
โSuffering is necessary when you are in this spiritual path.
โ July 1939: consoling Gulmai, who wept that she now had to live apart from him in Ahmednagar instead of on Meherabad Hill
โYou and your whole family are dear to me, and there is a certainty of our staying together in the future. Even if the whole world goes against me, you and your family won't leave me.
โ Sakori, January 1921: some time after telling Gulmai that she was his spiritual mother, Baba confided this to her.
โGulmai, as we communicate by means of this phone outwardly, we must be able to communicate inwardly, too.
โ Quetta, June 1923: Gulmai and the other women were staying upstairs in the Irani family home, whose rooms were connected by telephone to the restaurant below. Baba picked up the phone in the restaurant to talk to her.
โThere will be another world war; it will be much more destructive and extensive than the one before. Rivers of blood will flow! I will dip my kerchief in that river of blood and tie it around my head! Not until the world cries out for God will I give up my silence!
โ Meherabad, July 1925, on the eve of Baba's silence: explaining that his silence was also connected with the future of the world, Baba turned to Gulmai, one of the few women present.
โDo not worry about your current suffering. You will gain redemption and have liberation from rebirth.
โ Meherazad, 16 November 1956: for months Gulmai had been very restless, seeing visions of Baba and unable to sleep. Baba called her and Adi Sr. to Meherazad before leaving on a mast tour.
โWe are connected from the very beginning; I have taken birth through you in past lives. I have much work to exact from you in the future. A day will come when I shall elevate you.
โ Poona, early 1922: after the bhajans at his hut, Baba sat Gulmai on a wooden crate and sat on the floor near her. When she tried to join him on the floor, he stopped her, held her hand and told her she was his mother and he her son.
โWill you always stay near Mehera, as she is my Radha?
โ Nasik, January 1931: Gulmai had come to Nasik to visit Baba, and on one occasion he asked her this.
โDon't worry. It had to happen that way.
โ December 1941: Baba had told Gulmai to stay at Sakori during certain periods, but she had returned to Ahmednagar on 22 December, and Upasni Maharaj died two days later. Gulmai felt very bad about not being there, and Baba comforted her.
Gulmai went to Sakori in August 1919 only after two weeks of pleading by her sister. When she entered Upasni Maharaj's hut, she found that the nearly naked Master was the very figure who had appeared to her in a vivid dream, and she told him at once that he had what was not available anywhere else, and that she wanted only that.
On 24 May 1924, displeased by her husband's attitude and by an unkind remark from her son Rustom, Baba got into a car to leave Meherabad for good. Gulmai began weeping and, with others, begged him to forgive Rustom. After a long and tense discussion Baba agreed to stay on three conditions, and as he stepped out of the car he said, "It is only because of Mother that I have alighted."
Knowing Gulmai would die shortly, Baba told Padri on 6 August 1962 to prepare for her burial on the hill. On 11 August he came to Meherabad Hill, had the coffin lowered with its lid open, and placed flowers on her forehead and body while Kaikobad offered prayers. Baba told Adi she was very fortunate that he had been present at her burial. It was the last time Meher Baba went to Meherabad.
In 1921 Khansaheb built a new house, Sarosh Manzil, near the Parsi dharamshala in Ahmednagar where the family lived, in the Nalegaon locality. Gulmai refused to move in until Upasni Maharaj himself came to open it. Maharaj at first told her to make a seat for him and place his photograph on it, saying that would be the same as his coming in person, but she was not satisfied and asked him to come himself. Orthodox Zoroastrians and some of her own relatives strongly objected to a Hindu guru cutting the welcome ribbon. Gulmai refused to relent, and on Tuesday, 26 July 1921, Upasni Maharaj was garlanded at the door and the ceremony went ahead as she had planned.
Gulmai's in-laws ridiculed her faith in Meher Baba, and when it became unbearable she would weep alone in the prayer room where Upasni Maharaj had stayed. On the very day they mocked her most cruelly, Baba told Adi and Gustadji at Manzil-e-Meem in Bombay that he was very angry with Adi's father and that Gulmai would come to see him within eight days. She arrived exactly on the eighth day. Baba asked what she had been doing on a certain day, and she remembered it was the day she had wept while looking at his photograph. "Were you looking at my photograph?" he asked. When she nodded, he said, "How many tears did you shed on my behalf!" Then he smiled and said softly, "I see you in Adi's eyes. He is the frame, and you are the image inside."
Gulmai's husband Khansaheb had always revered Baba but had never loved him. Bedridden in 1945, he at last felt genuinely drawn to Baba, much to Gulmai's delight. When Baba visited him at Khushru Quarters on 19 September and asked what he wished for, he answered, "Good health for two months and, thereafter, liberation." Baba promised to fulfil his wish, Khansaheb garlanded him, and a photograph was taken of Baba with Gulmai and Khansaheb. Before leaving, Baba told Adi and Gulmai privately that he would be relieved of his agonies in October. Eighteen days later, on 7 October 1945, Khansaheb died at noon with Baba's name on his lips.
Memoirs of Gulmai K. Irani: Meher Baba's Spiritual Mother
Gulmai's own memoirs of her life with Upasni Maharaj and Meher Baba, edited by David Fenster and Keith Gunn and published by Meher Nazar Publications in 2022 (107 pp.).