Chapter 36: Interested In Remaining Disinterested
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Deshmukh stood up and entreated, "Baba, please accept his prayer." Then he extended an invitation to Baba to visit Nagpur, too.
Baba stated, "I will agree to the tour on one condition. Deshmukh must be ready to bear the expenses of the entire journey. If Deshmukh gives me one lakh [100,000] rupees, I am ready to proceed to Nauranga."
Koduri Krishna Rao said, "Baba, why should Deshmukh alone bear the charges?"
Baba answered, "That's my condition!"
Pukar addressed Deshmukh, "We will pay a lakh of rupees for your cap; accept it."
Deshmukh said, "I don't wish to deceive Baba."
Everyone scowled at Deshmukh, and Dr. Moorty observed, "Baba, you will have to come to Bengal also. Your visit there is long overdue."
Thus the arguments over where Baba should give darshan went back and forth.
Finally Baba stated, "It is such a big problem for me to visit where I already am. I would go anywhere, wherever you all are, if I were not there already. I am ever-present everywhere, and so the darshan tour as desired by you has become a problem. When I visit on my own accord, it is a different matter. I am in Nauranga and so it is not necessary for me to go there. Had I not been there, I would surely have come."
Adarsh Khare responded, "Yes, Baba, you are everywhere. But now we request Baba from Meherazad to visit Hamirpur District to see Baba at Nauranga."
Baba replied, "Baba is Baba! So Baba from Meherazad sees Baba at Nauranga without visiting Hamirpur. How can I pay a visit to myself when I am never absent?"
Eruch quipped, "So it would seem that first you must oust Baba from your district for him to pay a visit there."
Baba added, "Remember that Hamirpur is my heart, and Andhra my head. Both places are very dear to me."1
The Maharani of Baroda came to Guruprasad on 30 May, and at 4:00 P.M. the "Seven Avatars" drama was reenacted for her benefit. Madhusudan and Subhadra had gone to great pains to produce it and it was a grand success.
One day a woman approached Baba for darshan with her child. She requested that Baba bless her baby.
Baba commented, "As you wish. But do you remember how last year on your request, I permitted you to visit Guruprasad to have my darshan a second time? You did not come."
Footnotes
- 1.Baba's remark that Hamirpur represented "his heart," meant that the people there felt his love deeply, even though many were illiterate and had not read any of his books or messages. Andhra Pradesh representing his "mind" or "head" meant that the people there, though they also loved him intensely, were more intellectually inclined.