Story of a sadhak called Murarilal Parashar

Divine Madness

From his early childhood, as soon as Murarilal Parashar became a little conscious, he had the feeling that he was destined for some special mission in life.

He was born in a poor family, in a village which had a holy atmosphere and a mystic ambience, for Guru Nanak Dev had lived there for fourteen years. His mother died when he was only one. His father married a second time, but he was brought up by his grandmother. He studied in the village school and in due course he appeared for his matriculation examinations.

Their examinations being over, Parashar and his friends were in a boisterous mood. They played all sorts of pranks. One day they thought of a novel amusement. Since the examination results were eagerly awaited by all the students, Parashar and his friends made a fictitious bulletin in which they showed all their friends as having passed and all the boys they disliked as having failed. Each of them wrote a few lines of this bulletin so that their handwriting might not be recognised and pasted it on the school notice-board, forging the signature of the principal.

Soon a crowd of students collected as the news spread that the results were out. Some of the boys who found that they had failed went to the principal. The principal informed the students that he had not yet received the results and that it must be a prank played by some students. He strongly suspected Parashar and summoned him. Parashar was in a quandary but he decided to stick to the truth. When the principal demanded whether he had written the results he exclaimed, "No." The principal put his finger at random on one line written by one of his colleagues and asked, "Have you not written this?" Parashar could truthfully say that he had not written it. The perplexed principal dismissed him and sent a message to his father to appear before him the next day with Parashar.

On hearing the whole story, Parashar's father was afraid that the principal might send Parashar to jail for having forged his signature. He asked Parashar to go to Lahore where his elder brother was studying. This is what Parashar had been wanting all along, to proceed to Lahore to continue his studies, but his father had no money. Two rupees were needed for his train fare. Parashar's father borrowed the two rupees and sent his son off. The day Parashar reached Lahore his result was announced. He stood first and got a scholarship.

Four years passed and Parashar got his B.A. degree. He had a fixed idea that he must study for an M.A. So he took up odd jobs to pay for his education.

After his M.A. Parashar took up some tuitions since his whole being revolted at the idea of getting a job. His elder brother had died and Parashar lived alone. His life took a strange turn. The Divine stormed into his placid existence, upsetting his ideas, feelings, even his mental balance. An astrologer came from a village in Kapurthala to Lahore and went to one of Parashar's friends who, like Parashar, hailed from Ambala. This friend, having no convenient place for the astrologer, sent him to Parashar's room. Parashar welcomed the guest. Then, after leaving the key of his room with the newcomer, he set out for giving tuition to a student. In the meanwhile the astrologer found Parashar's horoscope chart lying in the room. With its help he kept himself occupied by working out Parashar's horoscope. This man had just come that day from a different city. He knew nothing about Parashar. On Parashar's return he asked him, "Did your mother die when you were only one year old? and do you have very weak eyesight?" An astonished Parashar replied, "Yes, it is so. But how did you know?" Pointing to his horoscope the astrologer replied, "It is all written there." Parashar was staggered. "What?" he thought, "Are we free or bound? Is everything in our life prefixed by somebody called God? If it is so, I must find God." For two days he could not eat and could not go out to teach. One question assumed tremendous importance, "What is God?"

After ten or twelve days of inner churning and agitation one night — this was in August 1931 — at 1 a.m., he felt some power touch his forehead. There was a lightning flash in his room illuminating it for a moment, and he heard a voice say, "You wanted to see God. Go and look into the mirror." Parashar went to the mirror. He saw his eyes and face flushed red and suffused with bliss. He asked, "Am I God? No, I am a person full of weaknesses. It cannot be so." The whole night a strange spiritual phenomenon took place and Parashar was in an abnormal state of consciousness. Seeing this one of his friends took him to a man reputed to be wise who declared that Parashar's stomach was upset!

Three or four months passed in a semi-tranced, semi-conscious state. One day in 1932, while Parashar was walking with a friend, a beggar asked Parashar for money. Parashar gave him his purse. The strange beggar asked for his keys. Parashar gave those also. His friend remonstrated, "Are you mad? Why are you giving him everything and what will he do with your keys?" Parashar replied that the beggar was only testing him whether he was ready to give his all or not. Anyway Parashar's friend made the beggar return the purse and keys. Very perturbed at Parashar's state, the friend led him to his maternal uncle's house, where his cousins invited him to join their card game. Parashar refused and said, "I am Krishna. I have come to save Gandhiji whom the British are troubling."

Parashar's cousins were alarmed. Convinced that he had become mad they took him to the lunatic asylum where one of the doctors named Ramsingh was known to Parashar's uncle. Parashar, who had truly become desperate in his search for God, thought that Dr. Ramsingh would surely lead him to Rama, since he had the Lord's name. The doctor knew Parashar as a promising and educated young man, so he asked him, "Why didn't you come to my house?" Parashar replied, "I didn't come because I had some work. I had to find God." Realising that Parashar was not normal, Dr. Ramsingh ordered the attendants to take him to "Yogi's room." Yogi had been a mental patient who had recovered and later been discharged but his cell was still known as "Yogi's room." Now Parashar was delighted. He thought, "Surely the good doctor is sending me to meet a yogi who will show me God." On reaching his room he was anxious to know how he should greet the yogi when he appeared. He asked two passing attendants, "Sir, tell me how I should do Pranam to the yogi?" These worthies had better things to do than answer the irrational questions of mad people and merely ignored him.

Two other warders came to Parashar's room. He asked them the same question. These two told each other, "He is a fake. He is pretending to be mad and is telling lies." On hearing this Parashar became greatly agitated and protested that he was not telling a lie. He attacked and overwhelmed these two. Five or six people were needed to control him. Meanwhile another mad man came there. With folded hands Parashar asked him, "Are you Guru Nanak?" The man replied, "No, but I am his disciple." This new arrival remonstrated with the warders, "Do not beat him. He is a devotee." At this stage the keepers understood that Parashar was not faking but was truly deranged.

After spending two days in a solitary room Parashar had quietened down. So he was taken to the courtyard where all the other inmates had assembled. He saw them all as Krishna and Shiva. He fell at everybody's feet. Another lunatic came to Parashar. Parashar asked him, "Surely you are God?" He replied, "I am not God, but I can give you the mantra by which you can realise God." He took up a twig and instructed Parashar to repeat the following mantra, "Pa, May V all go to that: pen is not much good." He further instructed Parashar to trace the words on his palms in a certain direction with the help of the twig and to always go forward or to the right — never to turn back or to the left. He added, "If you want water don't say, I need water, say I want H₂O." Parashar interpreted the mantra as "pa" standing for pita, father, and the rest as: "Let us go to God, this body should be changed."

Rejoicing in his good fortune at receiving the mantra, Parashar went forward, religiously obeying the instruction of his mad guide. He walked forward reciting his mantra till he reached an open drain. To its right was another drain. He was in a dilemma, for he could neither go back nor turn left. He jumped into the drain. The warders took him out and washed him and changed his clothes. The name of this lunatic who had given the mantra was Harishchandra. The warders were talking amongst themselves that Parashar was better (less insane) than Harishchandra. Parashar swelled with pride. He thought he was better than the legendary King Harishchandra, famous for his truthfulness.

Parashar had a hallucination-vision. He was on trial, charged with teaching immortality and murdering Gandhi. The judge sentenced him to be thrown down from the seventh storey of a building. It was done but Parashar remained unhurt. Then he was burnt by candles. Millions of people saw him and said, "He is God. He is God." In the vision itself at this stage the other lunatic, Harishchandra, came to Parashar and said, "It is the old way to find God. I will take you to God in a new way." Then the whole world started moving. Parashar saw all the saints and sages and then they reached somewhere. Harishchandra remarked, "It is Switzerland."

Parashar saw that it was not Switzerland — for where were the mountains? With this thought, in a flash, Parashar's sanity returned. He realised that he had been insane and was in an asylum. He understood that being thrown off the seventh storey (in the subtle plane) had somehow purified and freed him.

It was 21st February 1932. He asked to see Dr. Ramsingh and told him, "Now I am normal." Dr. Singh asked, "How can we believe it?" Parashar asked for a newspaper and told him and the warders exactly on which date he had been admitted and narrated objectively the whole course of events. They were convinced but kept him under observation for ten more days. After that they asked him to proceed to his village. Parashar told them, "Thank you, you are sending me from a smaller to a bigger asylum." The doctor said sternly, "If you say such things, you will be locked up again."

While in the asylum Parashar had constantly heard a divine voice repeating the famous couplet from Tulsi Das:

"Raghukul reet sada chali ayi pran jaye per vachan ne jayi."

(This is the tradition of the Raghu dynasty that they would rather die than break their word.)

In this way the Lord assured Parashar, "I'll never abandon you." His riddle, his tormenting query, "Are we bound or free?" was solved there. The Lord told him, "You are playing at being bound."

Parashar became free within and without. He decided, "I will not work for money, I will work only for joy. Thus I will accept whatever comes." During his madness Parashar had found himself to be two persons, one part of him did all the mad things, the other part calmly observed them. He found that this division continued. He told people, "First I was one, now I am two." Some people suspected he was still insane.

Parashar came back to Lahore. He had a cousin who wanted to go to Jammu. Parashar willingly escorted her and then went to Kashmir where he stayed for seven years. He had decided earlier not to work for money but for joy and happiness. He took odd jobs and gave tuitions. Mostly it was his friends who fed him and looked after him. He made them merry and led an easy life, smoking and drinking. The money he occasionally earned, his friends took away. In Kashmir he tutored the children of the then Director of Education, Dr. Tikku. The doctor was so impressed by Parashar that he offered him Rs.150 per month, plus boarding and lodging to teach his children. Parashar accepted the job.

Suddenly some enemies of the doctor worked against him and he was prematurely retired on a paltry pension of Rs.300 per month. Dr. Tikku regretfully told Parashar that he would not be able to afford his services any more. Parashar replied that he would work only for simple boarding and lodging. Dr. Tikku found it hard to believe that there were such selfless people left in the world.

Later, in 1934, Parashar came to Lahore for a few months. Here he had a premonitory dream that a certain friend of his, an inspector of police, had died. On meeting the inspector he narrated his dream to him and both had a hearty laugh, since the inspector was hale and hearty. But fifteen days later the inspector actually died. Parashar was constantly haunted by guilt. He felt that had he not told his friend about his dream he would not have died. He was tormented, he could not sleep. A few days passed. One night in a dream he saw a man with a shining face and beard, all clad in white. He sat near Parashar and said, "I am not your enemy, I am your guardian angel. It is not a dream. I have come to bless you. Why are you afraid of me?" He touched Parashar on his head, and all his fear and guilt vanished.

After four months, while Parashar was returning to Kashmir, he stopped at a guest house on the bank of a river. In a dream-vision he somehow crossed this river and climbed a very steep mountain, crawling up the steep ascent. On the summit he saw a man working a Persian wheel from which water gushed out and spread all around. Some other people were doing yogic Asanas. They were all perspiring. He hesitated to approach that man. Just then he heard a voice say, "He is the same person you saw in your previous dream." Thus reassured, Parashar went to the person and said, "Sir, you are working very hard." "Yes, some people have to work hard so that others may enjoy themselves." When he heard this Parashar said, "I am ashamed. I should not have come here." His guardian angel replied, "No, it is all right. Go to the opposite mountain." Parashar saw a European lady standing on the opposite mountain. He wondered what this European lady was doing in Kashmir. He went to her. The lady told him, "Don't look at my face, look towards my feet." When Parashar looked, he saw a big stone between her feet. She asked him to lift it and a fountain of sweet and cool water shot up and reached the head of the lady. She asked him to open his mouth and Parashar drank it and bathed in it. It was like being soaked in honey. This taste and feeling of an indescribable bliss lasted for six months. When he told his friends about it, they laughed and said, "You are still mad." Later, when Acharya Abhay Dev showed him the photographs of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, he at once recognised her as the Lady of the mountain and Sri Aurobindo as his Guardian Angel.

After spending six years in Kashmir an inner voice told Parashar, "This is over. You have far to go." Parashar asked, "But where? I have nobody in the world."

About this time he saw an advertisement in a newspaper put by a gentleman who needed a religious-minded person to tutor his children. The idea tickled Parashar. For fun he took up his pen and wrote to the box-office number given there, "I do not believe in religion. I drink, I smoke, I play cards and believe in enjoying life. I am however in search of love, beauty and truth. If you need a man like that, I am ready to come. Money is no consideration, but I should not be treated as an employee."

On 2nd September Parashar went to Gulmarg for a holiday. There he learned that the Second World War had broken out. He heard an inner voice say, "Leave this place after 2nd October." Parashar had hardly any money, he had no programme, no destination and yet the voice insisted that he should leave. On 3rd October he left for Muzzaffargarh in the North-West Frontier Province. There he had a friend, an income-tax officer, who had promised him some work. Here Parashar earned some money but lost it on cards. Finally he had only Rs. 32 left.

He wrote emotionally overwhelming letters to his uncle and also to a friend in Kashmir saying, "I am going I do not know where. If I ever reach there I'll write to you."

Next morning he woke up, perplexed as to where he should go. His inner voice, which he more or less obeyed, said, "Go to the bus-stand and take the first bus wherever it may go." Accordingly, he boarded the first bus which was bound for Rawalpindi. After paying for his bus fare he had only Rs. 25 left. He went to the railway station to check the price of railway tickets. He found the train ticket to Bombay cost Rs.21 and to Calcutta only Rs.17. He took the train to Calcutta. Soon he had only Rs.8 left.

At Mogulsarai junction, he got down to change trains. For a couple of minutes he hesitated and stood forlorn. He saw a tall military man nearby who enquired, "Are you going to Calcutta?" "Yes," replied Parashar. The man chattered on, "Babuji, in Calcutta do not go to a hotel. They will fleece you." Parashar's face fell. He said that he could not afford a hotel. The man continued solicitously. "Do not worry, Babuji. Before joining the army, I was a sweeper in a hotel there. Now I have got a job in Rangoon, but the watchman there is my friend. He will allow you to live there for fifteen days without any payment." Parashar was startled. He said to himself, "It is Krishna." Now he knew that he was not abandoned and God was looking after him. His faith increased a hundredfold. He left all to Krishna — his chosen deity.

On his arrival at Calcutta he was surrounded by hotel agents. One of them said his hotel would cost only Rs.1.50 per day. Parashar thought that in that hotel he could live for four days with his meagre sum. When he reached the hotel he was informed that it would cost him Rs.3.50 a day. After paying the rickshaw he had only Rs.4 left. He thought, "Let me live for one day and then I will look for somewhere else to stay." He heard a voice say, "You were sent here to stay. Look, I have arranged it for you."

For ten days Parashar searched for a job, for ten days the hotel did not ask for any payment. On the very first day Parashar had written about his arrival in Calcutta to a former student. This girl knew that Parashar never kept money. She sent Rs.100 by telegram. On the 10th day the hotel people asked him for payment. Parashar answered, "I'll pay tomorrow." He had not the least idea how he would pay. But the next day he received the money and paid Rs.35 to the hotel.

The man who was living in the next room, and whom he had befriended came to him in the evening. Parashar asked him, "Where have you been?" He replied he had had some work outside. He asked Parashar to wake him up next morning at 5.00 a.m. When Parashar knocked at the appointed time, his neighbour opened the door. He looked very worried. He told Parashar, "I need some money. I have to pay the hotel man something today, or he will turn me out." Parashar brought his purse from the room and handed it over to his friend. Though he gave his purse impulsively to this man Parashar feared that he might take away the whole amount. His friend took only Rs.10. Now these two became fast friends and planned various ways to leave the hotel which was rather costly. They both searched for jobs but without success.

One day Parashar decided to take a sheet and move on to the pavement, leaving his luggage as payment to the hotel for the seven days for which he had not paid, but on reaching the hotel he found two letters. One was from the gentleman whose advertisement he had answered for fun. It was redirected by his relatives in Kashmir. The gentleman had written, "I liked your letter." He offered Parashar Rs.90 per month, plus board and lodging. He also assured him that he would be treated as a family member and not as an employee, as Parashar had stipulated.

With the ten rupees he still had, Parashar bought a ticket to Delhi. The advertiser lodged Parashar with another friend in whose house the children were to be taught. Next morning, when Parashar was alone in the study room, he saw a shelf full of books. There he found a book, The Riddle of This World. The name attracted him and he opened the book. It opened on a page where the writer had written about the "witness self." Parashar had already had that experience in the mental hospital in which he had felt that he was two and not one, but which he had been afraid to tell anyone lest he should again be considered mad. When he read this he said to himself, "It was not madness, it seems to have been an experience." Parashar looked at the name of the author. It was Sri Aurobindo. He had not heard of that name before but a voice intervened and said, "He is the guru you are seeking. Now you have found him." The next day Parashar came to know that Sri Aurobindo was a Yogi in Pondicherry. Parashar went to bookshops to look for other books written by Sri Aurobindo. In a bookshop, amongst a heap of discarded books, he found a book, The Message of the Gita as interpreted by Sri Aurobindo. Its author was Anilbaran Roy. Parashar bought the book and lost himself in reading it. He found it the most satisfactory interpretation of the Gita he had ever read.

Now Parashar's employer went on an all-India tour with a friend. In the course of their wanderings they came to Pondicherry and had the Mother's Darshan. Their lives were changed and they started coming to Pondicherry frequently. They gave Parashar a copy of The Life Divine, published then for the first time. Parashar was so fascinated by the book that he raced through it and finished it in eighteen days. After reading this book his whole outlook on life changed. He said to his employer, "I'll not teach your children any more, but will remain with you."

This employer who was by then a good friend was actively participating in the Freedom Movement of India. Gandhi had started his individual Satyagraha. Parashar's employer was ill, so Parashar said to him, "Since I am now a member of your family, I'll offer Satyagraha for you." Thus he was jailed for one and a half years.

After completing his term in jail he again started giving tuitions. He tried to work with his former employer but found that they could no longer get along. So he started a school on his own. Sometimes doubts assailed him. "Am I doing yoga? Is it sadhana?" His inner voice replied, "Go on. Do not question. Do not run away." Parashar continued with his school but for fourteen years he read and reread the Mother's and Sri Aurobindo's books.

In 1953 his former employer, who had by then become a staunch devotee of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, had a dream. In the dream the Mother asked him to bring Parashar to Pondicherry, and to pay for his visit. Parashar agreed to go and thus came to the Ashram for the first time on 26th November 1953.

He had the Balcony Darshan and later saw the Mother going out in a car. Thus, fifteen days. Then Acharya Abhay Dev asked him, "Why have you not gone for the Mother's individual Darshan?" Parashar replied, "No one asked me and I didn't have the courage to go alone." Acharya Abhay Dev took him to the Mother. He introduced him by saying, "Mother, he is Parashar. He is from Delhi. He reads your books." What happened is perhaps better told in Parashar's own words:

10th December 1987. Thirty-four years ago (1953) on this day, at about 3.30 p.m., I was taken by Acharya Abhay Dev to be introduced to the Mother. I was to meet her near the stairs, down which she used to come to get into the car waiting to take her to the Tennis Ground near the seashore. While on the way he took me to the garden opposite the Ashram gate to collect a flower garland to be offered to the Mother. The gardener, however, told us that no garland was available and the only one he had was reserved for someone else. We therefore waited near the stairs empty-handed but with hearts full of love and adoration. There were still a few minutes for the Mother to come down.

In the meanwhile, the gardener came hurriedly saying that the person who had ordered that garland had not come and therefore I could offer the garland to the Mother. I was delighted and took the garland. The Mother was now coming down the stairs and was three steps from the bottom. When Acharya Abhay Dev presented me to her, told her my name and mentioned that I was from Delhi and that I used to read Sri Aurobindo's books at the Sunday meetings, the Mother cast a look at me from her sparkling eyes. I saw that behind the old body of the Mother a young beautiful girl was standing with her face full of smiles. The Mother's old body and the young girl were shedding glorious light and the breath of a cool breeze passed through my entire body from head to foot. The Mother came down, sat in her car and was driven to the Tennis Ground. My heart was leaping with joy and I was wondering whether I had seen the Mother or it was all a dream. Just then some acquaintance, a lady, came near me and asked me, "Did you see the glorious light on the face of the Mother?" I was satisfied that I had seen something real and not only a vision.

Parashar visited the Ashram again in 1955. He said to Tara, "I am going back. Why don't you take me to the Mother?" Tara replied, "You should write a letter praying for an interview." Parashar replied that he had already written a letter and given it to Nolini. Tara went to inquire; Nolini answered, "Yes, but Parashar is leaving on the 11th. The Mother has no time till then." Parashar had written in his letter, "Mother, I want to have the experience of being in your presence for two minutes."

A prayer to the Divine Mother is never in vain. Tara's brother had bought a scooter. He wanted the Mother to see and bless it. Parashar went to Tara's house. Dayavati, Tara's mother, told him, "My son is taking his scooter to the Mother. Why don't you go along?" Parashar went gladly. The Mother stepped down from her car and stood very near Parashar for a full two minutes or more. Parashar had the experience he had prayed for and his faith in the Divine Mother was reinforced. He understood that she knew everything in our hearts and fulfilled all true aspirations.

On one of his visits the Mother consented to give Parashar fifteen minutes' meditation. She asked if Parashar would mind if Tara came along for the meditation. Tara asked him, "Do you have any objection if I come with you?" Parashar said, "No." So both went together. The Mother asked Parashar, "Have you any question?" Parashar had none. Then the Mother smiled and told him to be seated. Parashar closed his eyes. When he opened them fifteen minutes had elapsed. He did Pranam at the Mother's feet and came out. Later Tara told him that the Mother had wanted her to convey to Parashar that he had good receptivity.

There is something sweet connected with this incident. While on his way to the meditation with the Mother Parashar saw Nolini, introduced himself and requested, "May I be with you for some time?" Nolini replied, "But you are going to meditate with the Mother today. If after that you feel the need to see me, you can come." Truly Parashar was so enthralled after seeing the Mother that he totally forgot to go to Nolini.

Parashar once wrote to the Mother, "I do not understand, but when I see Sri Aurobindo's photograph I see you standing behind him and when I see your photograph I see Nolini standing behind you."

Parashar closed his institution and lived with Surendra Nath Jauhar and did the Mother's work at the Delhi branch of the Ashram. One day Y, a European gentleman, saw the signboard of the Ashram Delhi Branch and went in and met Parashar. He was greatly impressed with Parashar and invited him to Europe and later provided for his needs, till the Government started paying him a freedom-fighter's pension.

Once his European friend took Parashar to Kashmir. There in his sleep Parashar had the Mother's Darshan and asked, "Mother, you have done everything for me; can I do something for you?" The Mother asked him, "Are you prepared to bear physical pain for the sake of my work?" "Why not, Mother? If you send it I will accept it gladly," replied Parashar. The next morning he found he had gangrene. This gangrene was caused by an injury. Parashar returned to Delhi. He was admitted to a hospital. The doctors assured him it would be a short stay — three or four days at most. These three or four days stretched into three months. Now the doctors thought they would have to amputate Parashar's leg below the knee. On being admitted to the hospital, Parashar wrote a letter to the Mother even though it was 1975 — two years after she had left her body — "Mother, I am in the hospital. The doctors may have to amputate my leg. This is not to pray for a cure or to spare me pain. It is just to inform you since you are my Mother. I am writing to the past address."

One of the doctors attending Parashar tried to convince the other doctors to amputate only two toes. He was hopeful that this might control the spread of gangrene. But the other doctors differed and a day was set for the operation. Parashar was prepared for the amputation and was brought to the operation theatre. He was perfectly calm and resigned. He took it as the Divine's will. Just before the operation, the lights failed and the operation was postponed for a day. That night the doctor who had earlier suggested that they should amputate only two toes convinced the other doctors to do as he suggested and, if that did not succeed, to amputate Parashar's leg later on.

Next day two of Parashar's toes were amputated. The wound started healing. Parashar had no money left. His European friend gave the money though he could not remain with Parashar any longer as he had to leave for Europe.

Parashar spent these three months in the hospital in deep concentration on the Mother. Most of the time he was indrawn. Actually he felt happy that he had this opportunity for inner concentration. But the bleeding did not stop. It was proposed that he should be shifted to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital where the doctors were hopeful about curing him. But Parashar had no money.

On 19th February, at 10 a.m. permission for admission to the other hospital was received. One hour earlier, a friend, the divorced wife of his European friend, having heard of his illness, came to see him. She brought Rs.3000 with her and remained to nurse him for a month and a half. Then she had to return to America.

Parashar came back to the Ashram branch where he stayed, but the bleeding continued. A homeopath stopped the bleeding but Parashar's arm was terribly swollen. The doctor who had operated on Parashar's toes was called. He said that Parashar should at once be taken to the hospital for an operation. Now the question arose: Who would look after him? Suddenly a young lady offered her services. She nursed Parashar for five or six hours daily. Time passed but the trouble continued. Parashar's European friend sent two tickets, for Parashar and a companion, to come to Europe. Parashar toured Europe and on his return after three and a half months he was completely cured.

Parashar thought that the whole of his life he had felt and experienced that the Divine Mother protected and helped him at each step. She took care of his needs. Also he has realised over the years that his "madness" was in fact a descent of a special consciousness.

Doctors wondered how 82-year-old Parashar could see or hear anything. Physically, his eyesight and hearing were totally gone. Yet Parashar could read and write what he wanted to and could hear everything that he wanted to hear.

Parashar visited Pondicherry from time to time and brought a number of bright young people to the Mother's feet, for he had always had a very innocent aspiration, "Mother, let me bring bus-loads of people to you." And as with all sincere aspirations his aspiration was also fulfilled.

He who had vowed never to keep money was well looked after by the Divine Mother; he who never married had many young devoted people who served him sincerely and lovingly, a truly divine family.

A Beautiful Death

Shri M. L. Parashar, who had lived at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram Delhi Branch for nearly half a century, came to Pondicherry on 9th April 1989. It was to be a very special journey. He had earlier written to his adopted son and friend, Professor Olivier Pironneau, to come from Paris to accompany him on this trip. Anu who looked after him with the devotion of a daughter came too. I met them on the 10th and it was decided that they would go to Sri Aurobindo's room the next day, namely, on the 11th and in the afternoon they would come to visit me and then I would take them to Amal Kiran (K. D. Sethna) whom Parasharji had particularly wanted to see.

The Mother has said that eleven is the number of perfection. And surely the 11th of a Darshan month is doubly hallowed. On this 11th at about 11 a.m. we met in the Ashram. I got the group a permission card to visit and meditate in Sri Aurobindo's room. Then I gave the three of them four flowers each to take to Sri Aurobindo's room—Agni (Fire), Prosperity, Surrender and a Hibiscus named by the Mother "The Beauty of the New Creation". Out of these four flowers Parasharji was attracted specially towards the flower Agni and he twice ascertained its significance. About this salmon-pink flower with deep red veins and a deep red centre the Mother has said, "Agni—the Flame of purification which must precede all contact with the invisible worlds."

The later events reveal the reason for his instinctive fascination for this particular flower. On this eleventh he had a tryst with death and a tryst with life. This seemingly paradoxical statement is not truly so, for a tryst with death opens doors to a birth in a new body which would be capable of housing the developed consciousness which the old and the worn-out body could not contain or support. That is why a tryst with death is also the promise of a new-birth.

Masterji, as he was known to many whom he inspired and who loved and revered him, came to Pondicherry in his eighty-third year as if to leave his body at this place—a destined death, it seems. Let me look back a little. My contact with Parasharji started when my poem "Divine Madness" appeared in the May 1986 issue of Sri Aurobindo's Action. Since Parasharji had experienced this exalted state which the poem pictured and which the Shastras call Unmatta vat—"like mad"—he felt an affinity with me and, later, on one of his visits to Pondicherry he met me. With time the contact deepened. Once on an inner impulse I enclosed a blessings packet in my answer to a letter from him. He received it while he was having a heart-attack. The blessings packet gave him the needed strength, and though great damage was done he cheerfully went on to play the game of life for two more years, though the doctors would wonder what kept him alive. It was the Mother's Grace and his own firm will and the loving care of his 'children' that kept him going. At that first meeting when he said he came to Pondicherry to see me he narrated his life-story which afterwards appeared under the serial "How They came to the Ashram" in Mother India's September, November and December 1988 issues.

To come back to the present - on the 11th April at about 4.30 p.m. - we met in the Ashram courtyard and from there proceeded towards my house. On the way we went to Golconde on an unscheduled visit for him to see the beautiful wall-painting done by Krishnalal. After passing some delightful time in the beautiful ambience of Golconde where Commodore Satpal showed Olivier and Anu this architectural marvel, we came to my house where Parasharji partook of some fruit and snacks and drank some lemonade. Later he recounted some stories of the Mother's Grace and promised to write them for the second volume of my book Vignettes of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. He told me how he had liked very much the portions of the first volume of Vignettes he had read the previous day. He was trying to collect money to publish my Hindi poems.

At 5.30 unaware of the Invisible Summoner waiting in the wings, we went to see Amal Kiran where Parasharji reminded Amal how several decades earlier when he had come on his first visit to Pondicherry, they had travelled together from Villupuram. Amal, he said, was the first Ashramite he had met. It so happened that he was the last Ashramite Parasharji made it a point to visit. Parasharji had a remarkably clear memory and quoted a striking sentence which had ended one of Amal's articles written in a 1950 issue of the then fortnightly semi-political Mother India, published from Bombay.

A little after, at 6 p.m. the group left Amal's place. He thanked me warmly. I took my leave of him little realising that it was farewell. Parasharji said he wanted to go to the Samadhi. So he, Olivier and Anu went to the Ashram. There he asked Olivier to give him some water. After drinking the sacred water of the Ashram and paying his respects at the Samadhi, Parasharji and Anu proceeded towards the International Guest House while Olivier and Shipra (who had been waiting for them in the Ashram) went to arrange for a taxi for a visit to Auroville the next day. Outside the Ashram Anu wanted to take a rickshaw but unluckily there was none in sight. So they walked slowly towards the International Guest House. A few metres' distance from the Guest House Parasharji suddenly trembled. Anu made him sit on a stool in front of a tea-shop. There two or three times he repeated, "Ma, Ma", and his soul left his body.

Two years ago Anu had seen her father pass away just like this when she had returned from a visit to the Ashram. She understood that all was over. She put him in a rickshaw with the help of some onlookers and tenderly resting his head on her shoulder drove to the Trésor Nursing Home, where not finding any pulse the persons there directed Anu to take him to Dr. Raichura. But when Death takes over what can doctors do? It was evidently his soul's secret choice to die in the sacred land of Pondicherry in the Shukla Paksha—the fortnight of waxing moon. Meanwhile the people of the Trésor Nursing Home called Chamanlalji who along with Shipra had been very close to Masterji. Promesse and Lata—his old students—came too. Since he belonged to the Delhi Ashram it was in the fitness of things that he was carried to a room of the Delhi House (the erstwhile Ira Boarding), which Shipra made beautiful with her artistic touch.

And there he lay serenely, till 5 p.m. of the 12th. His friends Rachna, Dr. Matish and a cousin flew from Delhi to pay their last respects. The Mother's music was played. Sri Aurobindo's and the Mother's garlanded photos were looking benignly at him. He lay on an Ashram sheet and was covered with an Ashram sheet (he had come by air and had brought no bedding), and went to the pyre wearing an Ashram dhoti. There was no sorrow in the atmosphere. His young friends to whom he was very precious bore the sudden blow yogically.

He had always had a child-like aspiration to bring bus-loads of young people to the Mother's Lotus Feet. His aspiration was fulfilled. With some of these young bright souls around him he went on his last journey, on the sacred soil of Pondicherry, carried by young hero-warriors of the Mother and his body was consigned to Agni—to the spirit of the flower he had chosen to take to Sri Aurobindo's room.

In his memory

by OLIVIER PIRONNEAU

Dearest Parasharji,

Smt Shyam Kumari asked us to report on your passing away two days back and I volunteered.

It is a bit awkward to write to you when I feel you are so near but it is hard to resist the pleasure, of going once more to the keyboard, to direct my thoughts to you and let my heart open to express this psychic love that you sowed fifteen years ago when we met for the first time in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Delhi Branch.

News of your death has spread like wild fire in the Pondicherry Ashram and people say to us:

How wonderful! Mr. Parashar has died like a yogi, he came specially to Pondi to leave his body.

And we answer: "Yes, of course," because we knew that you were a yogi.

Before relating the events that show how you left your body, perhaps I should try to explain to the reader in what way you were a yogi. This is also interesting; in particular it brings up another subject: if one is a yogi then one's own life is an example and thus friends could become disciples. In your case everybody was your fellow-traveller on the path. But how can that be when we have the unsurpassable teachings of our divine Masters, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother?

A yogi you are indeed but of an unusual path, the path of life, of human passions turned to the Divine, as the Mother told you. It takes a lot of courage to accept that nothing is intrinsically bad, that adverse forces can be seen as having the Divine behind them if one looks deep enough and to believe that "not a blade of grass can move without His will" is wonderful, but to live the far-reaching consequences that this poetic phrase implies in our daily struggle for happiness is indeed the work of a yogi in the true sense.

"Thus nothing is to be discarded really but our attitude; nothing is to be changed but our outlook on things. Life is a riddle with God as its key. Problems, unwanted vibrations or situations, even sickness and death are God-sent and the problem lies really in our incapacity to follow Nature in its evolution, in our egoistic reactions (a denial of our true nature), in our mental way of looking at this far-reaching plan of perfection which is leading this universe."

These true words of yours you lived so convincingly that by speaking with you one could get by contagion some of the delight that seemed to be the basis of your consciousness. Of course all is described in Sri Aurobindo's writings, in the chapters on Bhakti yoga, for example, and also in many lines of Savitri; so nothing is new. All right, nothing is new and truly when everything is harmonious an hour of reading of Savitri sends the reader to heaven, carried by the words of the poet into the vastness of his supramental visions; every line adds to the delight of the heart, oh! to read Sri Aurobindo is to be with him, surely it is a wonderful experience that can be renewed so many times, tirelessly. But to reach that state of equality to begin to appreciate Savitri is not given to everyone at birth, and the presence of a friend who can explain things or even where to start from is a blessing. Not to speak of the countless occasions that man's mind can find to lose its way and get stuck in obscure corners. In these fifteen years that we have known each other, hundreds of people have crossed the tiny doorstep of your room with a depressed face and come out with a smile full of enthusiasm for life. And to many who have had this experience you have become very very dear.

To others it looked a bit strange; what do you find in this man who can't see, can't hear, can't walk properly, spends most of his time reading Sri Aurobindo again and again as if he did not understand what he read? So the people who did not know you, or those who could not come close to you, could not guess that your mind had been silent since 1932 and that you had attained a very rare state of equality from where you would spend days together without a thought coming, turning to the Divine the minutest reaction of your various selves.

The common man wants miracles and to him of course your realizations were not very visible. So Mr. Parashar, was a yogi? Some even would object to your free habits (and they didn't know that you could eat meat, drink whisky if offered...) "Asceticism is not for me," you used to say; "in most people it is suppression of their vital nature; I prefer to watch my nature and wait till it is ready to change." When one's vital nature grumbles, Sri Aurobindo's yoga can appear dry and abstract but we have all learnt from your living example that the Integral Yoga aims at delight, delight right down to the veins of the body, and for this one needs to catch the difference between mental control and true understanding.

Anyway, here we are, four from Delhi, two from Pondi, sitting in Ganpatram's café around a cup of tea, one day after a sleepless night, the last homage given. United by your love but silently missing something, each one of us feels in his heart gratitude for what you were, for having known you, such a wonderful paradox.

How did it happen? I don't know; none of us was to come to Pondi this month because you had been here already in December and I had come in August; but I cancelled my trip to the US because I felt it was more important to meet you and Anu wanted to pray at the Samadhi. So once again we are here, the three of us, astounded by the pervading vibrations of the place. For the first time in your life, at the age of 83, you have come twice in twelve months to the place of your Love. (In the fifties, some people suggested to you to come and live here, so you wrote to the Mother; she said it was for you to decide, but being passive by nature you decided that you could equally love your masters from Delhi.) Absolutely nothing could point out that you would leave your body on that auspicious 11th of April 1989 after a meditation at the Samadhi and earlier on the same day you were taken to Sri Aurobindo's room; your health was perfect and you did not show any sign of fatigue. But this you did, to our greatest surprise, precisely at sunset. You went away quickly, without pain, without disturbing the solid peace of this place.

We will miss you, dear Parasharji, unless the presence of the Divine that we saw in you has already entered our heart, unless the work is done; in your happy childlike approach to things you used to say:

I want to bring bus-loads of people to the Mother.

Your friends, with Love and Gratitude.

P.S. The following is a transcript of the last part of the only recorded conversation I have had with Parasharji; it was made a few days before leaving for Pondy. It is all the more striking that when, fifteen years ago, I crossed the road from IIT to find someone who could teach me meditation, I was introduced to Parasharji who told me that I did not need to meditate and that all my problems would be solved by taking the witness attitude. Thus the circle is completed.

… What I like is that you don't force your meditation on you.

Oh no! I don't like it, I don't like it! no! because that is ego. And the fact of meditation is there, I mean to say if after meditation you don't find any change in you it means that you have not meditated at all. And sometimes though you don't meditate the meditation catches you; that is the best meditation; even for half an hour as compared to twenty-four hours, it is much better. You know, something in us is always meditating, you have just to catch it and spread it to other parts.

Is that what you do?

Oh yes. In fact, I was never interested in meditation, I mean to say to sit cross-legged and all that. But now when I meditate, I sit like this (back straight), automatically it happens. If I sit otherwise, I am not comfortable. This has come.

When I talk about the Divine, then I am more meditating because the Divine comes on the surface; he is not very far then. He gets into my words, into my feelings; and when someone comes and is really anxious to know something, when he goes away I wonder whether he has given me something or I have given him something; such a relation it is.

I can imagine a life, a complete life where one is all the time totally one with the Divine, that I can imagine, totally, in all parts.