The period of three months is very critical for me. During the seclusion, I may suffer from paralysis. From the 1st of August you can do correspondence, but I am not bound to reply.
The following instructions for the mandali staying in Satara were then read out:
1. One and all are now free to decide to hold on to Baba's daaman [life of obedience to Baba] just up to the end of July 1955 or to the very end. They are equally free to leave Baba and live as they like and to do what they want after the 30th of April or after the 31st of July 1955.
2. In any case, every individual must arrive at a decision on his own quite freely and according to one's own free choice. But in every case, the decision must be really decisive and final.
3. Those who cannot help feeling that they have had enough of the life of obedience to Baba had better now leave Baba and do what they can in order to live as best as they want. Baba would not at all be displeased, because he is offering this freedom of choice on his own, equally to one and all who have so far stuck to him so splendidly through thick and thin. It is far better to leave now than to become a mardood [apostate, condemned] by leaving Baba after deciding to hold on to him.
4. Therefore, those who would like to leave Baba should do so before the 1st of May or after the 31st of July 1955. Those who now decide to continue to remain with Baba and yet, if anyone from among them leaves before the end of the relative definite or indefinite periods decided upon — that is, at the end of July 1955 or the very end — that one will lose all his connection with Baba, and whatever service he has rendered to this day will all get washed out.
5. Before arriving at one's decision, Baba wants one and all to give full consideration to the following facts:
a) Baba would not mind at all if one and all decide to give him up and do leave him now or after July 31.