Eruch and Baidul were called to Meherazad on the 19th. They received instructions from Baba and then Eruch returned to Poona and Baidul to Meherabad.
That day, Baba repeated what he had said the previous February, after Mahatma Gandhi's assassination: "Seventy-five percent of humanity will be wiped out in 1949."
Early on Wednesday morning, 22 December 1948, Adi Sr. brought Manek Mehta and Burjor Mehta to Meherazad. Manek was the leader of a group of Parsi Baba followers who called themselves the Jap Mandal.
Baba asked him, "Is anyone in your Jap Mandal prepared to surrender to me?"
"That is not such an easy matter, Baba," Manek said, by way of excuse. Manek was receiving financial help from Baba, and had become a pseudo-guru himself to the (mostly female) members of his group. He asked Baba for further help, and Baba replied:
What do you hope to get from me? The people of your Jap Mandal think spirituality consists in japa, tapa, yogic practices and seclusion in the Himalayas. Is this spirituality?
My Avataric work concerns the whole universe! It is not confined to the petty conceptions of individual spiritual gains after following individual prescribed theories. It does not depend on any fixed rules, practices or resolutions. My work is on a greater and vaster scale than Krishna's. Krishna ordered Arjuna to slaughter his own relatives! Can such a thing be dependent on any principle? Krishna ordered it for the supreme good, and Arjuna carried out his order.
But, like Krishna, I want some sacrifice. I want a few such men. Even if there is just one from your group who is willing to make such sacrifices, it would be sufficient reward for all your efforts and labors with the Parsis.
The year 1949 will be a year of chaos, confusion and disturbances, and you speak of the unsettled mess within your group! Without me to guide and inspire the institution, it will become insignificant and non-existent. The eddies and whirls of individualistic natures, even of those with a so-called spiritual aim, will be engulfed by the oceanic upheaval of the Avatar's manifestation. I warn all those who are in my contact about it!
Manek had proposed that Meher Baba's name be disconnected from his group, and Baba was cautioning him not to do so. In fact, Baba told Manek to turn over the entire management of the group to him, and to come and stay with him, which Manek refused to do.