Laughing, Baba spelled out:
So it is for Meher Baba, too! You have been observing, over the past many years, that despite this hostile agitation against me, my work goes on spreading. You have watched with mixed feelings of pity and regret for those who do not understand, nor do they want to listen to the facts, and thereby bring themselves in for ridicule. How can my work ever be affected by this lying campaign through the press and before the public? All this hue and cry against me, all this propaganda, has not affected my work adversely in the least. On the contrary, it has brought my name and work into greater prominence, by arousing the idle curiosity of people with silly rumors and sensationalism. Those who come to ridicule me, return penitent after seeing me and gathering the true facts!
My work, begun from Poona and Ahmednagar and covering Bombay, Madras, South India and North India, has now reached the West. It spread to England first, and from there, has extended through Europe, to America and the whole world! Is this in itself not proof? Up to now, I have often been working in seclusion. Still, day by day, the number of my followers increases. I do not see the public and also do not meet those who outwardly make a show of seeing me. And yet, how unique it is that those who could live in palaces, in all comforts, do a sweeper's work by staying with me. Therefore, there is none so blind as those who do not see, though having eyes!1
You are my soldiers, and to destroy your self — your ego — you have to fight for me. While fighting in my arena, remember that you are dealing blows to your ego.
Meanwhile Venkatapathaiya began corresponding with Colonel Irani and others opposed to Baba. He held his own public meeting on 10 December 1939, for the said purpose "to examine the credentials of Shri Meher Baba and to protest against the establishment of the Meher Baba Universal Spiritual Center at Byramangala."
Jal Kerawalla, Ghani, Deshmukh and Norina had published a small booklet titled Meher Baba's Raj [Reign] of Truth , which attempted to allay the public's fears about Meher Baba and to answer some of the opposition's criticism. With Baba's consent, they attended Venkatapathaiya's meeting and tried to distribute the booklet.
Footnotes
- 1.Baba meant those who meet him but do not recognize him.