In 1949 Baba travelled from Nainital to Kashipur via Haldwani with nine devotees. When they arrived in Kashipur, they stayed in the house of Kishan Chaube, who extended great hospitality to them. Throughout the day all the devotees in Kashipur came with offerings of food and milk for Baba. Baba ate many platefuls of food that day and drank milk in large quantities. Before evening, however, he said he was hungry. He sent his devotee Pooran Chandra Joshi to a nearby lane saying, “A woman is waiting there. She has prepared roti for me. Go and bring it.” Joshi went into that narrow lane and saw an old woman sitting in an open doorway. As soon as he spoke Baba’s name, she happily disappeared inside and returned bringing a thick roti and some green vegetables. At that moment Baba himself arrived and taking the roti in his hand, ate it with great relish.

Baba and the group of devotees returned to Haldwani by train from Kashipur. Chaube had purchased a second-class ticket for Baba. By mistake he bought only eight third-class tickets for the nine devotees who accompanied him and gave the tickets to one of them. All of them sat in the second-class compartment with Baba except for a pandit (religious scholar), who travelled in the third-class compartment of the train. Suddenly Baba asked the devotees, “How many tickets are there?” A devotee replied that Chaube bought tickets for all. Baba sternly asked, “Where is Pandit’s ticket?” They counted them again and realized the mistake.

Baba took all the tickets from them and threw them out of the window of the moving train, making all of them ticketless travelers. A special checking squad was checking the train that day, and the eight devotees sitting with Baba were government servants. They worried about losing their jobs if they were caught traveling without tickets. At the next station Baba got out of the train and went to sit with Pandit in the third-class compartment, as did the devotees. Just then Baba put nine third-class tickets into the hands of a devotee.

The train arrived at the Lalkuan station late at night, after the connecting train to Haldwani had already left. There was no other train for Haldwani nor was a bus available, so they thought they would have to spend the night at the station. However, as Baba got down onto the platform, a Muslim truck driver standing nearby noticed him, wrapped in his blanket. He stared at Baba with great curiosity. Baba also looked at him and said, “Your wife is ill? You are sad? You have taken her to Bareilly, Agra, and other places and still there is no improvement? Do not worry, she will be alright.” He listened to Baba in quiet amazement and then humbly asked him, “Baba, where do you want to go? My truck is standing outside. If you will allow me, I will take you wherever you like.” He then took everyone to Haldwani in his truck.

Excerpt from The Divine Reality of Sri Baba Neeb Karori Ji Maharaj by Ravi Prakash Pande “Rajida”

Original Article

On a dark evening in Bhumiadhar, November 9 1962, Brahmachari Baba was warming himself by a fire, outside the temple on the roadside. Maharaji was sitting alone in meditation in his kuti. A thin, weak man with long, matted hair, wearing shabby and tattered clothes, came and sat quietly near Brahmachari ji. His hands and feet were both twisted. Brahmachari was looking at him, taking in every detail, when Maharaji came running out shouting, “You have come, you have come,” and sat with them by the fire. Since Brahmachari ji was in Baba’s service, he got up and stood beside him.

Baba asked the visitor, “Where have you come from and where are you going to?” He replied, “I have come from Pilibhit and am going to Meerut.” Brahmachari ji wondered to himself why he had come to Bhumiadhar instead of going directly from Pilibhit to Meerut. Just then Baba asked, “What is the purpose?” He said, “Lal Bahadur Shastri is to be made the prime minister.” Hearing this, Brahmachari was surprised, for there was no question of making Shastri prime minister in the lifetime of Jawahar Lal Nehru.

Baba then enquired about his devotees one by one. The first question Baba asked was about Brahmachari ji, who was standing by him. The man said, “Brahmachari is the guru of sadhus.” After many questions like that one, Baba asked about Tularam Sah saying, “He is lying sick in Ramsay Hospital, what about him?” With a heavy heart he said, “It is not good that you save everyone. He will certainly die on the seventh day from today.” Baba at once got up and returned to his kuti. The stranger also went on his way and disappeared at once. On the seventh day after this incident, on November 16 1962, Tularam passed away. The sadhu did not mention a timeframe for Shastri ji, but he became prime minister after a year and a half.

Excerpt from The Divine Reality of Sri Baba Neeb Karori Ji Maharaj by Ravi Prakash Pande “Rajida”

Original Article

One day Baba was sitting on a parapet by the roadside when a sadhu named Balak came and offered pranaam to him. Baba said to Balak, “What’s the trouble?” Balak told him that he had been suffering from stomach pain since the previous evening. Baba gave him some of the remaining water from the lota (metal pot) that he used when washing. Balak drank this, and then Baba made him run around. In a little while the pain subsided.

The same day Pandit Mama also had pain in his stomach. Baba immediately got him admitted to Ramsay Hospital in Nainital and sent his devotees to enquire about his health throughout the day. A devotee asked Baba the reason for according different treatment to Pandit Mama. In reference to Balak, Baba said, “God takes care of the person who has no one to look after him. Pandit is a well-to-do man. He wants good treatment and also expects others to express their sympathy for him.”

Excerpt from “The Divine Reality of Sri Baba Neeb Karori Ji Maharaj” by Ravi Prakash Pande “Rajida”

Original Article

• Some people came with an objective or an attachment. One very rich woman came to Maharaj-ji with a big box of sweets for Maharaj-ji. She wanted to take the sweets for herself and her friends outside. She held out the box to Maharaj-ji so that when he touched it the sweets would become prasad. Maharaj-ji took the box and the woman would not let go. She held on and tried to pull them away from Maharaj-ji. But he pulled them back and then the woman pulled again. This happened again. Back and forth. Then Maharaj-ji pulled so hard that He got the box away from the woman. Then Maharaj-ji said, “You can go now.” The woman was so sad. Maharaj-ji started to distribute the sweets, but Usha said,”Maharaj-ji, You can’t do this. This woman will have a heat attack before she leaves and who will pick up her body?” So Maharaj-ji and Usha watched as the woman left the ashram and walked to her car. When she got in the car and had driven away, only then did Maharaj-ji distribute the prasad.They laughed and laughed.

• Some young people were at Kainchi Ashram fooling around and talking loudly about their own things and interests… their own business. Maharaj-ji stormed out of His room yelling at them and chased them right out of the ashram. They ran out of the ashram and Maharaj-ji ran right after them yelling all the while. Even right across the bridge, He chased them. Maharaj-ji said the ashram is not a place for the worldly thoughts. That the ashram was a place where your heart and your thoughts were able to become one. That to go and stay at an ashram for a year was a way to ‘recharge you batteries’ and that after that you could go back into the world and do your work again, in the right way. This is why Maharaj-ji had many rules and inforced these rules very strongly.

Original Article

Question:  How can I judge myself less harshly and appreciate myself more?

Ram Dass:  I think that part of it is observing oneself more impersonally.  I often use this image, which I think I have used already, but let me say it again.  That when you go out into the woods and you look at trees, you see all these different trees.  And some of them are bent, and some of them are straight, and some of them are evergreens, and some of them are whatever.  And you look at the tree and you allow it.  You appreciate it.  You see why it is the way it is.  You sort of understand that it didn’t get enough light, and so it turned that way.  And you don’t get all emotional about it.  You just allow it.  You appreciate the tree.  The minute you get near humans, you lose all that.  And you are constantly saying “You’re too this, or I’m too this.”  That judging mind comes in.  And so I practice turning people into trees.  Which means appreciating them just the way they are.  And, there was a period of time where I used to have a picture of myself on my puja table.  Later I had Caspar Weinberger, but earlier on I had me.  And people would come and say “My God, what an ego this guy has got.  He has got his own picture on his puja table.”   But really, what it was, was a chance for me to practice opening my heart to myself.  And to appreciate the predicament I am in.  I mean I could see the whole incarnation.  If I am quiet enough, I can see his story line.   I mean history is his story.  Or herstory.  And herstory is just the story line of our predicament.   And it’s finding a place from in yourself where you see the unfolding of law.  Dad did this; Mother did this; economics did this; education did this; opportunity did this; drugs did this; Maharajji did this.

All of this cause and effect, previous incarnations.  All of this is just an unfolding of a story line.  A drama.  The Ram Dass story.  There he is.  How will it come out?  How did it come out?  And you are just sort of watching this story unfold.  It has nothing to do with me.  Because I’m not that.  That’s just a set of phenomena happening.  And when you look at yourself as a set of phenomena, what is to judge?   I mean is that flower less than that?  It’s just different than that.  And you begin to appreciate your uniqueness without it being better or worse.  It’s just different.  And cultivating an appreciation of uniqueness, rather than preference, is a very good one.  It’s just when you get inside identification with your personality that you get into the judging mode, because then you are part of that lawful unfolding.  You are not stepping outside of it at all.  The witness or the spacious awareness is outside of it.  It is another contextual framework.

As you are more quiet inside so that you notice and you can see your own thoughts a little more clearly, you will see your father’s voice and your mother’s voice and all your education principles voices inside your head constantly saying things to you.  And you will see that — what Freud calls  the Super Ego.  You will see that that judge is inside.  And you keep giving it power by identifying with it.  And you feel yourself at war with yourself.  That there is a part of you that is doing it, and there is a part of you that is judging what you are doing.  And as you are quieter, you see the dynamics between the Super Ego, the Id, the ego.  And you see it all as just phenomena.  Because they are phenomena.   As a psychologist, I can study those phenomena in another person; why not study it in myself?   And part of what drugs did for me, and then mediation did for me, and all the spiritual things is it helps me stand back and get outside of it.  To see it for what it is.   As just stuff — phenomena.

Original Article

One morning, Babaji began talking about pujas and prayers and going on pilgrimages. “Prayer and worship should be done by everyone, every day, as the highest obligatory duty to God; visiting temples and pilgrimages should be undertaken only under favorable conditions and suitable times. They are not essential for your worship and religious duties, whereas prayers and pujas are, and must be done in some form or other.” When everyone was hearing him with full attention, he looked at me and said curiously, “Dada, you stay at home.” I did not understand what he meant by that, so I could only reply simply, “Thikhai, Baba.” (All right, Baba.)

While we were sitting that night and talking, Tularam said that what Babaji said was not random, but had something to do with my sadhana, my spiritual endeavor. Staying at home meant avoiding pilgrimages to temples and religious centers. He said that they were not necessary for us, since we had secured shelter at Babaji’s feet; there was nothing rare or extraordinary we could get from pilgrim­ages that we could not get by staying with him.

However, most of the time in pilgrimage was spent in Babaji’s company, and that would not be possible for me if I were staying at home. Tularam had become so intoxicated in his love and devotion to Baba that there was no sense in trying to place before him my own differences and disagreements with his judgment. My silence was taken by him to be full concurrence with his opinion.

Two days later, our morning sitting with Babaji was interrupted by the visit of an old devotee. He wanted to say something in the presence of all of us, but Babaji prevented this, and took him alone to his room. After some time, Babaji asked me to give him prasad and arrange for a rickshaw. While I was going with him to the rickshaw, the man said he was from Madhya Pradesh. When he was young and working under a forest contractor, he had known Baba. Many miracles happened there at that time. He had been cut off from Babaji for all these years until some people said Babaji visited this place in winter, so he had come in search of him. He had wanted to talk before us all, but Babaji took him to his room and told him that he should not talk about those things. Babaji said that when people who had known him for so many years did not believe these legendary miracles, how could these people believe? It would be better if he did not talk at all.

We had been standing before the rickshaw talking for some time when Babaji shouted for me. He had shifted to the study room and was lying silently on the mat laid on the floor. There were several others with him — Tularam, Siddhi, Girish, and a few more of the house. Babaji asked Tularam to hand over his packet of cigarettes to a young man standing nearby. When that had been done, he said smoking was kharabhar (bad); Tularam must not smoke anymore. He asked the boy to destroy the cigarettes and throw them in the nearby basket. Then he pointed to Ram Prakash to bring his packet of cigarettes from the pocket of his silk kurta and to throw it in the basket. Then the boy came with my packet of cigarettes. Holding it in his hand, he said that this was Dada’s packet and he should destroy that also. Babaji stopped him saying, “Give Dada his cigarettes back. Let Dada smoke.”

No one could understand what he meant by allowing me to continue smoking. It was a mystery. Was it because smoking was not harmful for me? We were all left guessing. But when I was sitting with Tularam he said, “Did you understand what this meant? Smoking is not bad for you — at least not now. Babaji knows this, and there must be something deeper behind it.” He went on, saying that he knew that smoking was not good for him; everyone in his family also knew it, but they had not been able to stop him. Babaji knew how much we enjoyed our smoke when we were sitting together — it was actually the lubrication in our unceasing talks, and he would not stop that. But now because he (Tularam) was to go away, his smoking could be stopped. It was grace coming all the time, but in different forms. I did not understand him fully then, but after going over it for all these years, now I do.

Excerpt from The Near and the Dear: Stories of Neem Karoli Baba and His Devotees

by Dada Mukerjee

Original Article

A young Englishman named Lawrie once stayed in Babaji’s ashram at Hanumanghar for about a year. He had been interested in India’s spiritual heritage and had come to India to learn about it. He had met Babaji, secured his grace, and was allowed to stay in the ashram, studying with Haridas Baba.

One day some devotees were talking to Babaji about Lawrie and his spiritual practice. Babaji said he would soon be going away—his “maya ” was coming and would take him back to England. Some days later, Lawrie’s lady friend, Susan, arrived in Nainital. Babaji told Didi that they would be visiting Allahabad and would stay in the house for some days and she should arrange for them.

Didi arranged a small room for their use. When she had opened the door to fix up the room, she found that one wall was full of footprints. She was astonished to see them and was convinced that they were Babaji’s. Many devotees came to see the footprints and believed them to be Babaji’s, but could not understand what they indicated.

A few days later, Lawrie and Susan arrived. Every attempt was made to make their stay comfortable, but there were some difficulties about their food. Lawrie was used to pure vegetarian cooking, but Susan was not. She complained to Didi directly that she was losing her health because her food was being neglected. This was hard for Didi, who had taken so much care with all the arrangements. Tears came in her eyes.

Shortly after, a devotee came with his car. He had received a phone call from Baba, asking him to take Lawrie and Susan to his house for a few days. They had been “transferred.” Babaji arrived after a few days and consoled Didi. He explained that Lawrie and Susan were old friends who were planning to marry. When Lawrie did not return from India, Susan came to bring him back. They had no money and didn’t know what to do.

They were given the passage money. On the day they were to leave, Babaji left for Chitrakut with some devotees. He told me to accompany Lawrie and Susan to the station that afternoon. With tears in his eyes, Lawrie begged to be excused for all their lapses.

The devotee in whose house they had been staying also came to the station and then gave me a ride home in his car. We sat on the porch and he told me about the strange behavior of his guests. They had stayed in their room all the time, bolting it from inside. This created some suspicion in his mind. It was the time of the Indo-Chinese
conflict and he thought they were spies, transmitting radio messages from the closed room. When he made that statement, I could not listen to him any longer. He had his tea and prasad and then left.

Soon after, another car pulled up with Babaji in it. He sent the people who had come along with him into the house, and he came and sat with me. He asked about the whole episode. “You went by rickshaw to the station? Did Didi accompany you? They went in the car? What did Lawrie say?” All these things he recounted to me, rather than asking. “How did you return? You came by car? It was good of him to bring you home. You-must have offered him tea and prasad.” These were all preliminaries. “You were talking? What was he saying about them? Why did he go away so early? Weren’t you talking to him?”
After repeated inquiries, I had to disclose that man’s suspicion about Lawrie and Susan being spies. “You became angry with him because you did not believe that? Why didn’t you believe him? Why?”

After that kind of hammering I said I was annoyed because I could not imagine how a person who claimed to be a devotee could think that Babaji would put him in such a dangerous situation. I said to Baba, “You knew everything about them and you could not do anything that would create trouble.”

He was stroking my head while I was talking. When I stopped he laughed and said, “Do you think that everyone is a fool like you? There are wise people who look at things differently.”

Original Article

My mother and aunt were deeply religious and accepted Babaji as the head of the family. Ma would often tell us that the family and the household belonged to Baba and we were all his children. Her whole treatment of him was based on the fact that Babaji knew what was in the minds of everyone and behaved accordingly. He treated them as his Ma and Maushi Ma, giving them all the freedom and indulgence and grace. They reported to him everything going on in the house and sought his advice and guidance for running it. The most important duty assigned to them was to prepare the food and feed everyone coming to him. “Ma khana khilao” [Ma, make food] was his pet method of asking them to feed the people. Often emphasizing the importance of their work, he would say, “Maushi Ma, this is the home of the deity. Here everyone gets his food, so I also get mine.”

My mother was from a very orthodox brahmin family and formerly she could not imagine that a lower caste person would enter the kitchen. None of the servants were allowed to dust or sweep there or bring in the drinking water from outside. Ma was like that and I could not have thought of changing her attitude. But with Maharajji around all those things eventually changed. West­erners came and were entering the kitchen. Ma also became recon­ciled to Muslims entering the house. Maharajji was not forcing her to do this; her whole outlook had changed. She began feeling that all were her sons and daughters. If she is not keeping me away from her kitchen, how could she go on keeping others away? Now, from where had this wider outlook come? Of course, Maharajji had done that, but all he had said was, “Ma, give food to all.”

Ma and Maushi Ma had become accustomed to treating Babaji as their near and dear one, and would talk to him without any formal­ity. Babaji enjoyed that. Whenever he left for any place, they would invariably ask him where he was going, when he would come again, and sometimes they asked him to extend his stay in the house.

Once Babaji came and left two days later. Ma asked him to stay for a few days more. He said, “Ma, let me go now. I have some important work to attend to. I shall return soon.”

Ma said, “You have no work as such—the only work that you have is to run away.”

He laughed and said again that he would return soon. Three months passed and he had not come back. Ma said, “Look, so much time has passed. This is low. He goes on bluffing us.” Babaji arrived a few days later. When they came to see him in his room, the first thing they said was, “Baba, you speak so many lies. You promised you would return soon. Now you have come after three months!”

Babaji replied in his inimitable way, “Ma, where do I go? I am always here. Believe me, Ma, I never speak lies to you. I am always here.”

By Dada Mukerjee from By His Grace

Original Article

One summer a rich businessman was living in the ashram with his wife and two teenaged children for a month. Seeing how the feeding was done every day, he expressed his interest in feeding sweets to the people visiting the ashram and sought Babaji’s permis­sion to do so. He said he would get the required ingredients from the market and the sweets would be prepared in the ashram kitchen. Babaji gave his consent, but he advised me not to get involved.

The laddus were prepared and brought before Hanumanji’s temple in the morning, but the method of distribution was far from satisfactory. Children were put to various kinds of tests before they were given the sweets. Some were sent to pluck leaves from the forest for serving them. Many children were sent away with­out any because they were suspected of coming for second or third helpings, no matter how they denied it.

When the day ended and the gates were closed, more than half of the sweets remained undistributed. I told Babaji it was a disgrace for the ashram and he should not have encouraged the project. First he said, “How can I force people to give these things away if they do not want to do so?” I told him that it was entirely against the tradition of the ashram that people should go away without getting prasad. Then he said, “I just wanted to show that it is not easy to do bhandara in the name of Hanumanji. If you give only to the people of your choice, then the food will remain and go to waste. If you have offered your food to Hanumanji, it no longer belongs to you. Hanumanji himself sees that people get their prasad.”

He said to make more sweets in the ashram and do another bhandara, preparing a much larger quantity and distributing to everyone in the real tradition of the ashram. Two days later the laddus were prepared, about fifteen mounds in quantity. Since only the regular visitors would be getting the prasad, some felt part of the sweets would surely remain undistributed. But Babaji’s ways of getting things done were unpredictable.

When the sweets were being distributed, some old people and the children started eating them right there. Babaji came several times during the distribution. He said that anyone who wanted to eat the laddus here should be given as many helpings as they could eat. “It is Hanumanji’s bhandara. You need not be worried about anybody not receiving prasad.”

One old woman began crying, “No one has ever fed me like this before.”

By one o’clock the whole supply was exhausted and Babaji went around the ashram shouting, “Dada has distributed the entire prasad!”

Now here was a lesson. If you think that you or I have some­thing, we cannot give. You must think of it as Hanumanji’s—that only he can give. You are only the ladle, the leaf on which it is being given.

Original Article

Babaji at first called me by my name, Sudhir, or just “Profes­sor.” It was in 1961 that one day he started calling me Dada [elder brother]. Others followed, but not my Ma and Maushi Ma. He asked them why they called me by name and not Dada. When they said that a son is not addressed so, he said, “When he is my Dada, he is your Dada also.”

One day I was alone with him and he asked me, “Your friends are not coming now. They must be warning you about the danger of coming under the influence of a baba and being close with him. They love you and therefore they warn you for your own good. Am I wrong?” I had no reply to give. He was right.

I was rather an outsider at the beginning, and I was not psychologically or mentally prepared for the difficulties and disturbances his coming created. I was quite interested in social and cultural life, going to the pictures, making friends, addressing various kinds of cultural gatherings, meetings, debates, and I had a very large circle of friends. They would come and gather together just like members of the family. Now when Babaji began coming, there was no place for them to come and sit. Also, many of my friends did not like the idea. “Oh, you have become the victim of some baba!” When his visits contin­ued, they would say I was wasting my time. In spite of all their solicitations, I could not change my new way of living. I was losing my interest in my old life, but I could not think that Babaji had anything to do with it. For me it was just like dry leaves falling from the tree, without anybody’s hand behind it.

Maushi Ma had already apprised Babaji about the agreement with the contractor and said it was all done by Baba. “I do nothing. It is God who does everything. Thank God for his grace.”

Ma said, “Baba, we do not know God, but we know you. So we are saying that you have done it.” Babaji changed the topic of talk.

[caption id=”attachment_311” align=”alignright” width=”400” caption=”Maharaji with Dada and Dada’s nephew”][/caption]

A few days after he left, the construction of the house started. It was ready within four months and we shifted to it in the middle of July 1958. Some minor finishing work was being done when Babaji arrived four days later. He was accompanied by three old devotees. He showed them around the whole building and explained all about the house and how it was built. “Red house, red house. Very well- built.” We had never before seen him behave like an innocent little one displaying his excitement.

One day my auntie said to Babaji, “Baba, you love Dada so much. You have built such a beautiful house for him.”

Babaji replied, “Dada’s house? This is my house! Dada is my guest.”

More than two years passed and there were several visits that he made during that period, but his stay never exceeded three or four days at a time. Whenever he came, someone accompanied him. There were no bags to be carried or any work to be done for him. The only clothes he wore were the dhoti and a blanket, or a white sheet to wrap around his body. That was all he used to have with him whether he was staying with a devotee or travelling. Whenever a devotee would make him change his clothes, he would leave the clothes he had come wearing. His food was also very simple and it was easy for his devotees with modest means to feed him. He was not a burden to his devotees; this we could see from the very beginning. It was much later I realized that, although he was never any burden to his devo­tees, he himself was carrying so much of their burden.

After that time, Maharajji would come to Allahabad for the winter months, and many devotees would come—Siddhi Didi, her husband Tularam, Jivanti Ma, and many devotees from Nainital, Lucknow, Kanpur and other places. Sometimes Babaji would go out for a few days to Benares or Vrindaban or Jagganath Puri. I couldn’t go with him because there were so many people coming to the house and I had to look after them. Very seldom would he take me along. When he wanted to go on a long journey he would ask Didi’s brother, who was posted in Kanpur, to send his car and driver, Brijlal, who was an expert driver and also a great devotee.

Much later in 1964, he went to Jagganath Puri with Siddhi Didi and a few others for a week. One day the car came and the driver opened the gate and shouted at me, “Dada, Maharajji took us to Dakshineshwar, to the Shiva temple, and he said, ‘I gave mantra to your Dada in this temple.’” Then Siddhi Didi and others who were also there narrated the whole thing in detail to us.

Now all this shows that you do not go to him, he comes to you. This was all his grace, I had done nothing to deserve it. I did not know him. I did not seek mantra from him. He caught hold of me and gave me that. Then he came to that house and said, “Henceforth I shall be staying with you.”

-Dada Mukerjee from By His Grace

Original Article