Features | Experience of the Divinity of Bhagavan by Devotees | Group IV | Mr. B. Satyanarayana

Mr. B. Satyanarayana,
Kothapeta - 533 223,
East Godavari District,
Andhra Pradesh.

Mr. B. Satyanarayana (68), who retired from the Police Department, relates a few of his experiences of the Divinity of Bhagavan in his own words.

'I first heard about Sri Satya Sai Baba from a visitor whom I had met at the ashram of Bendapudi Sadhu (saint). That visitor told me that he too had not visited Prasanthi Nilayam thus far and that he would let me know about it later. After visiting Prasanthi Nilayam, he wrote to me a letter stating that every thing was there at Prasanthi Nilayam which a sadhaka needed and that one should visit it without delay. But I could not go there for a long time, however much I wished. All this happened in 1951 when I was a student of VII class.

I joined service in 1961 in the Public Health Department after completion of my education. I saw the photograph of Bhagavan in the mandir at Eluru, found out about Swami again and then went to Prasanthi Nilayam for the first time in 1961. It was my first visit. Swami was coming and talking to every one except me even though I stayed there for 20 days. I returned to Eluru only to know that I had lost my job due to my long absence. Later I got a job in the Police Department. In 1962, I came to Prasanthi Nilayam again. It was my second visit. It was Dasara season. Swami did not talk to me this time also even after 30 days. I sat before the mandir in a depressed mood and was toying with the idea of committing suicide. Then suddenly the door of the room on the ground floor opened and Swami came out. He called me in.

'The human body is very valuable. Is it your sweet will and pleasure to shed it whenever you want?' He chided me. He then went on narrating to me a number of my childhood instances and asked, 'you have a particular disease (He named it), isn't it?' I was stunned. Not even my mother knew about it. Swami created vibhuti and personally rubbed it on the affected part. The disease disappeared instantaneously. I fell on His lotus feet shedding tears of joy. 'He is God,' I told myself. Since then I have been visiting Prasanthi Nilayam regularly every year for Sivarathri as well as Dasara.

In 1965, my second daughter, Ms. Sai Padma fell ill. There was no improvement even after treatment for three months. The doctor said that her liver was badly damaged and that there was no hope of her survival.

I wanted to go to Prasanthi Nilayam for Sivarathri. My wife, Mrs. Satyavathi insisted on accompanying me. So we went along with Sai Padma. One day Swami called me.

'How is every one?' He asked.

'All well, Swami ', I replied.

He asked again.

'My second daughter is not well, Swami!' I said.

'Yes, I know. Her liver has been spoiled,' Swami said, 'however, it does not matter. It will go. I will give medicine'. I was stunned. The doctor also said that it was a case of liver damage. How did Swami know?

We were there for 30 days. Swami used to give me fruits and say, 'this is for the child and this for your wife. Keep them separately and give them.' He used to give fruits almost daily. There was no improvement.

One day Swami called me. 'Here is the medicine', He told me as He materialized a bottle, 'give this to your wife.' Then He materialized another bottle and said, 'this is for your daughter.' On both the bottles I saw a label that read, 'Sai Potency'

We returned and used the medicine given by Swami for a week. My daughter's health improved and she became quite normal in all respects. When I took her to the same doctor who had treated her and declared that there was no hope of her survival, he asked, 'who is this girl?'

'My daughter,' I replied, 'the very same girl about whom you said there was no hope of survival'. He was amazed.

'Who treated her?' he asked.

'Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba' I said, 'He blessed her with a new life.'

One day my Inspector called me and said, 'here is an urgent message, take this and hand it over in the SP's office at Kakinada.'

I left with the letter and the warrant for the journey. But, instead of going to Kakinada, I went to Prasanthi Nilayam. I cannot say why I did so. I was here for one week. I had no idea about the urgent message to the SP, or no fear about my job. After one week, Swami called me and said, 'have padanamaskar and go'

Then suddenly it dawned on me about the letter I did not deliver, and the consequent fear of punishment. I was unable to tell Swami either. I stood there awkwardly giggling when Swami said, 'don't be afraid. No fear. What can it do? I am here, go!' He materialized vibhuti and gave me. Even though Swami assured me thus, I was still nervous and returned to my place of work thinking that my job was gone.

The Inspector was furious when he saw me 'Where were you all these days', he roared.

I told him that I had gone to see God.

'Are you in your senses?' he shouted at me, 'how can you say that? Give some other reason; otherwise you will lose your job'.

'That is exactly what happened' I said, 'I am telling the truth'.

'Shall I record like that?' he asked me, vexed with my impudence.

He recorded what I had told him, in my presence, in the General Diary, When I came to my place of work, everyone looked at me with pity that I was going to lose my job. I, too, was expecting something worse, even arrest. Days passed by and nothing happened. .Swami saw to it that nothing happened which would have adversely affected my service.

Once a friend of mine and I started on a pilgrimage on the spur of the moment without taking even a pair of clothes. We did not even inform our families that we were leaving. We wanted to visit some ashrams of famous saints and then go to Prasanthi Nilayam. Swami was in Kodaicanal at that time. We went to Malayala Swami Ashram at Yerpedu. We met one junior swami of the ashram and asked him to tell us about some famous ashrams so that we could visit them. He told us about many ashrams, but did not mention Prasanthi Nilayam. We were not only surprised, but also felt hurt on the important omission.

'Swami!' we asked him, 'you gave the names of all ashrams, but did not mention Prasanthi Nilayam'.

'Because' he told us 'it is above everything. It is beyond our comprehension. It is much more than an ashram.'

We came to Bangalore. There a stranger came to us and asked, 'are you Police?'

We were in mufti. How did he know? We were amazed. We did not reply. 'Swami is at Brindavan. You go there and have darshan', he told us. We were thinking that Swami was still in Kodai, till he told us. We went to Brindavan. Swami called us.

'Why are you wandering like crows?' Swami chided us, 'you won't get anything anywhere except here. You have not even told your families about your pilgrimages. Do you know how anxious they have been feeling about you? What do they think of you? Is this the way Swami's devotees should behave? If you behave like this, what do people think of my devotees? Get back at once. I will give you prasad'. He materialized vibhuti and gave us. We returned.

My third daughter, Ms. Sai Geetha was seriously ill. The doctor said there was no hope. This happened at a time when my visit to Prasanthi Nilayam was due. I wanted to go to Prasanthi Nilayam whatever might happen. So I placed the onus of saving her on Swami and left. When I was at Prasanthi Nilayam, they sent me a telegram to return at once as the condition of the girl grew more serious. I kept the telegram in my pocket and sat for darshan. Swami came along the darshan line.

'What is that in your pocket?' He asked. I did not reply. 'Take it out' He asked me.

I took out the telegram. 'Don't worry', Swami assured me, 'I will give prasad. Take it and give her.' He materialized vibhuti and gave me. I returned to my place and gave the vibhuti to my daughter. Miraculously, she recovered, and was completely healthy in a few days.

Once when I was in Prasanthi Nilayam, we were all sleeping in the veranda. Swami generally did not come down till 2 p.m. during those days. I was awake, as I did not get sleep.

Swami came down suddenly at 2 p.m., saw me and called me to His room. None of those asleep in the verandah knew about my being called by Swami.

'What do you want?' Swami asked me, 'ask. Anything you want.'

'I do not want any thing, Swami' I said. Swami asked again the same question and I gave the same reply.

'Very good' Swami said, 'if you have gold, you can get any jewellery prepared. If you have grace, you will have all.'

Once I was called by Swami in the night at 9.00 p.m. Mr Suryaprakash who used to be at the door of Swami's room was also there. Swami gave both of us two baskets filled with waste paper, envelopes and letters. 'Take them to the hilltop and burn them all there.'

It was pitch-dark. Doing namasmarana, we both carried the baskets to the hilltop. I kindled some fire and began to burn the things in my basket.' Don't burn like that' Mr. Suryaprakash told me, 'I collect stamps as a hobby. There may be some envelopes sent by overseas devotees. I will take the stamps, and we will then burn them.'

As I was looking in the basket for envelopes from abroad, I stumbled upon large-size currency bundles. We were shocked. What to do then? If we returned them to Swami, He might say 'why did you look at them when I simply wanted you to burn them?' If we burnt them, He might ask, 'why did you burn notes?' We should not have looked at them at all. I prayed to Swami and burnt the whole lot because that was what He had told us. We returned, but we were very much afraid. We could not look at Bhagvan for about a week. But He never asked us anything about it. We surmised that it was a test to us.

I was in seva at Brindavan when Brindavan Ashram was inaugurated. They prepared 20,000 laddus for distribution on the occasion, to devotees. But the turnout was beyond expectation reaching or even crossing one lakh. Bhagavan suddenly came into the room where the laddus were kept. He took two coconuts and hit one against the other. They broke into four halves correctly. He then sprinkled the coconut water on the laddus and left. All devotees got the laddus. There were so many left that we took them in lorries for distribution in schools. All of us in the sevadal were given packets of several luddus each. I heard about such miracles earlier but I could see it personally for the first time then.

On the same occasion, Swami was taken from Kalyanapuram to Brindavan in a procession. When we all reached, along with the procession, the gate of Brindavan, the rush was so much that it looked like heading for a stampede. How to take Bhagavan in was a big problem. Then I saw Mr. Raja Reddy, perhaps on a cue from Swami, holding his hands from behind Swami, while Swami was walking in front of him, inside the hands of Mr. Raja Reddy spread widely. I saw people pressing on Mr. Reddy's hands with a view to coming near or touching Bhagavan. But they could not push his hands even an inch. Even a big wrestler would have yielded to such high pressure from the surging crowds. How could Reddy withstand? We all deduced that Swami made Anjaneya to infuse Reddy with his might and strength.

Once I came to Prasanthi Nilayam. One night a lorry load of rice arrived there. The driver and cleaner also went somewhere. Swami called me and Mr. Suryanarayana, a co-devotee and said, 'both of you unload the bags of rice and put them in this room one on the other' How could we do that? Only two of us were there. Swami went away. What to do? We had to do what He told us. So we began to unload the bags. We were pulling each on to our back and taking it to the room. Neither of us was used to that type of work.

When I kept the first bag in the room and turned back, I saw Swami at the entrance to the door. He had a bunch of grapes in his hand. He removed one and gave me. I ate. Like this we went on unloading the bags and arranging them one on another without any help. Swami was giving us a grape fruit after arranging each bag in the room. We completed the work successfully owing to Swami's grace. One thing we could not forget was the taste of those grapes. Next day I went out and brought a kg of grapes, but that taste was not there. Was He energizing us with the grapes? Next day I expected to have bodily pains, but there was no sign of tiresomeness that night or any pains next day.

When we were in seva at Brindavan, a group of 100 devotees came to Swami from Bangalore and requested Him to give them some work that day as it was a Sunday and they wanted to do some seva.

'I have monkeys here' Swami said pointing to us, 'you may go back' He did not open the gate even, however much they pleaded. We were only nine sevadal available and did all the work. Some times our hands used to develop blisters. If we paused to look at our hands, Swami used to laugh and say, 'don't you feel ashamed to look at your hands like that? Do seva happily, not as if you were being compelled'.

Once when I came to Prasanthi Nilayam, Swami asked us to shift a big gate and put it opposite Ganesh Temple. It was near the site where the temple of Subrahmanya now stands. They had to fix iron girders and lift the gate using an old model crane. When the work was in full swing and the gate was lifted up and was in the process of being shifted towards the place where it had to be carried, one of the iron girders fixed securely in the earth gave way, and the whole thing fell down. All of us ran to safety while a young man was crushed under it crying Sai Ram. He was shifted to the hospital in an unconscious state, almost as a hopeless case. Swami was also informed.

'He got life only till today,' Swami remarked, 'but, no worry, I have extended his life'. Afterwards the boy recovered and regained complete health over a few weeks.

Once when I was in seva at Prasanthi Nilayam, I and Mr. Suryanarayana, a co-devotee, were going along the canteen. Suddenly we heard some one scream in severe pain, and rushed into the canteen .The sight we saw there was ghastly. Mr. Mahalingam, a cook in the canteen and another person prepared a basinful of upma and were bringing it to the place where it was to be kept ready for service. On the way it slipped and all the upma fell outside. Due to the pull of the falling basin, Mr. Mahalingam also slipped and fell on the heap of upma which was at boiling point. We tried to pull him out and carried him to the hospital. Mahalingam's skin came out and stuck to us as we carried him. Swami was informed, and He sent Vibhuti prasad which was applied on the boils. Doctors were openly sceptical of his recovery. But he miraculously survived. He is still in service in the canteen.

I was thinking of getting my daughter Ms. Vanaja Kumari married. One of my relatives suggested a match. But as I was in a hurry to go to Prasanthi Nilayam, I did not pay much attention. At Prasanthi Nilayam, Swami told me 'we will get your daughter married.'

I said, 'your grace, Swami!'

'What is the bridegroom doing?' Swami asked. Actually I had not seen any bridegroom. Suddenly I remembered the match suggested by my relative while I was coming to Prasanthi Nilayam. So I said without thinking, 'he is doing milk business, Swani!' I said.

'Good', said Bhagavan, 'go ahead. Do it in the month of Shravan. They will be happy.'

The same alliance was settled, but they were doubtful if the marriage could be performed at a short notice in Shravan. I said 'it is the time fixed by Swami. So He will see to it that every thing falls in place'. I performed the wedding well owing to Swami's grace. As Swami observed, they are quite happy.

When I was at Prasanthi Nilayam, someone complained to Swami about the rude behaviour of some people at Prasanthi Nilayam with the devotees.

'A farmer first plants the fence with thorns and then sows the crop' Swami said, 'when the crop comes, it will be safe because of the thorny fence. Only the crop is taken, and the fence remains where it is.'

-- Mr. B. Satyanarayana

(As narrated to Mr. B. Parvatala Rao at Prasanthi Nilayam on 25.07.2005)