We are good, you are good, the whole world is good! Kaka is kanya [grain seller], Mama is Marwari [businessman] and Savak - kotwal [government officer]. Eruch is Pathan, Pendu is pistoo [pistachio], and Masaji is considered a Moghul. The rest of the lot are all rice, dal and dhunia [coriander]!1
From 26 May 1941, Baba began fasting again and subsisted only on fruits, orange juice and water (with no curtailment in his mast work with Baidul). Six days later, on 1 June, he remained on only water, and at one minute past midnight broke his fast with a cup of tomato juice. Later on that day (the 2nd), he ate a little rice and dal.
On 3 June, Piroja left Ajmer with Meheru, Naggu and the Kotwal girls, who had been spending a few weeks of their summer holidays in Dehra Dun and Ajmer with Baba and the women. Savak Kotwal accompanied them. He was sent to Meherabad for a day, and returned to Ajmer on the 7th. Swamiji had been staying in Bangalore, but became ill after a lecture tour of South India. He died at his cousin Sampath Aiyangar's home in Madras on 4 June. Swamiji had been observing silence for many months according to Baba's orders, but before taking his last breath, he uttered Baba three times.
Baba was informed and sent this cable: "Nobody need feel sad but rather glad because Ramanujam [Swamiji] has come to me."
With Baidul and Savak, Baba left Ajmer on Sunday, 8 June 1941 to contact masts. Baba had ordered a taxi, but it failed to arrive on time. After waiting half an hour, he walked the distance from the bungalow to the taxi stand and took another. As he got in, Baba covered his face to avoid being recognized. They traveled by taxi, train and bus for more than 500 miles, but did not rest for even half an hour during the entire 78-hour trip. Baba contacted three masts in Nasirabad, but there is no account of them.
In Beawar, Baba contacted an old mastani and then a young, naked mast called Narain Baba , who constantly repeated the name of God, " Narain! Narain!"
The most significant mast Baba contacted was the sixth-plane saint Nuru Baba in Sojat. A revered man of 80, he lived naked on the verandah of a chosen house, surrounded by ten or more dogs. This saint was a mast from birth, and such types of advanced souls are called madar-zad.
In the town of Abu Road, Baba contacted Khuda Bakhsh , an old mast of 75 who had for 40 years sat unmoved, like a living statue, in a Mohammedan shrine, and during all 40 years did not speak to any living person. When Baba contacted him, however, he was moving and speaking and wandering about the town in his ragged attire.
Baba had some mast contact in Unawa, also, but there is no account of his work there.
They returned to Ajmer on the 11th, without ever having unpacked the bulky bedrolls which they had taken with them. They had gone unshaven, and had taken no bath during the continuous, round-the-clock mast hunt.
Footnotes
- 1.A Pathan is a hefty, muscular man from Baluchistan, often a soldier. (Babajan had such men as her bodyguards.)