Mansari—whose real name was Mani Behram Desai—earned her nickname because she came from Navsari in Gujarat ('Mani from Navsari'). Baba also affectionately called her 'Chilli.' Standing only 4 feet 4 inches tall, she became the devoted caretaker of Meher Baba's Tomb Shrine at Upper Meherabad, where she lived for over fifty years.

From the age of five, Mansari suffered from an incurable skin disease that the best doctors and finest hospitals in Bombay could not cure. In 1923, before she ever met Baba, He visited her uncle Sorabji's house in Navsari and sanctified every corner—preparing, as it were, for her future.

Her first meeting with Baba came in May 1927 when Kaikobad brought her to Meherabad at age 18. Though skeptical about Baba, she wept upon meeting Him. Baba instructed her: 'Don't worry; you will be permanently cured. Take some ash from My dhuni, and every morning before tea, say My name and swallow a pinch of it.' In one month, she was completely cured of the disease that had plagued her for thirteen years.

But when she heard that Baba had developed the same skin disease, she worried that He had taken her suffering. Her disease returned. Baba then told her: 'Let it be as it is. Neither you nor I will have to suffer. This was all My game to draw you to Me. It was I who created this incurable disease, and now that you are Mine, you will never suffer from it again.' The disease left her forever.

On June 15, 1938, at age 28, Mansari became a permanent member of the women mandali. In 1943, Baba assigned her to live at the top of Meherabad Hill, telling her: 'I will be very happy if you remain on Meherabad Hill.' Initially she cried at being separated from Baba, but she came to embrace this assignment as her life's work.

Baba gave her strict restrictions—she was not allowed to leave upper Meherabad beyond the railway line. This confinement became her spiritual practice. When she once came out during Baba's seclusion to see Him, He scolded: 'Let your heart go to hell! It is no heart if it does not follow My wish! Why do you call it a heart?' And yet Baba also assured her: 'You are mad! I am not keeping you away from Me. Even if you wanted to be away from Me, I would not allow it.'

Mansari's courage was tested when, after Baba appeared in her dream and told her not to be afraid to kill a cobra, two cobras actually appeared in her room. She killed them both with a bamboo staff. Baba later appeared in another dream saying: 'I am quite pleased with your courage. Now no snakes will bother you.'

One of the most remarkable events she witnessed occurred on August 5, 1969, when Dr. Donkin visited Baba's Samadhi. The next morning Mansari found the earth in Baba's crypt disturbed and saw a flash of white like a sadra hem. A wonderful fragrance began emanating from the Samadhi—one that crowds of pilgrims experienced for four days. On August 9, the fragrance mysteriously disappeared—the same day Dr. Donkin died.

Mansari also served by translating articles from the Meher Baba Journal into Gujarati in 1941. She passed away on January 12, 1997, at age 87, and her ashes were interred on the Meherabad Hill she had tended for over fifty years.