Moments. The buds wait for the moment when spring weaves its magic by unleashing a burst of colors. On the sea-bed, a speck of dust waits to be snapped up by an oyster to find deliverance as a pearl. A mother bird holds fort patiently, to witness her fledgling take wings for the first time and covet the sun. The seed holds the sapling captive until it is able to pay the ransom of sturdiness that will enable the sapling go one-up over solid ground. Every wonderful moment is worth a wait. As for each of us, the alumni, we wait too. The brightest moment this year arrived on its first day, and our lives came a full circle. We had arrived home to the welcoming embrace of our dear Mother Sai. It was our moment. Alumni gathered in large numbers this year at Parthi, heart strings tugged by the hope of beginning a new year at Bhagawan’s lotus feet. Also, in our memories lay the magnificent promise Bhagawan made to us on the same occasion last year “Come every year to Parthi on Jan1st and 2nd. I will bless you, and give you Ananda”.

Ever since alumni began to arrive at Parthi towards the end of December, Swami kept enquiring about the number of ‘His boys’ that had arrived. Arrivals increased each day leading upto Jan 1st, and when the final count was taken alumni strength had swelled to over five hundred and fifty. Of this number, two hundred came with their families, including around a hundred and eighty children.

Swami had kindly consented to an alumni program at New Year’s on December 3rd. Since then the planning process gained momentum, with senior alumni taking the lead in coordinating the program and engaging the alumni community across the globe.

Like every year, village service was the first group activity on the agenda. On the morning of 31st Dec, Grama seva activities encompassing medical & veterinary camps, Narayanaseva, Balvikas, and tree plantation were undertaken in four villages.

Coordination of the seva and managing logistics for each activity, including the provision of free food to more than three thousand villagers, was ample testimony to the magnitude of effort put in by alumni. The grama seva also helped strengthen unity among alumni as they assembled to serve beloved Bhagawan.

Divine Drama

From the evening of 31st December on, the now christened 3rd and 5th blocks of Kulwant hall were reserved for alumni. What followed thereafter was testimony to Bhagawan’s tremendous love for alumni. Just as love is Bhagawan’s first nature, His first test is our acceptance of His uncertainty. His divine love and uncertainty formed the highlight of this new year’s celebration at Kulwant hall.

The drama began when Bhagawan initially conveyed to senior alumni that the alumni programme should be held in Kulwant hall on the evening of 1st Jan. However, on New Year  ‘s Eve Bhagawan asked  for an announcement to be made in the mandir that new year celebrations in Kulwant hall would be held the next morning itself. The announcement created confusion over whether current students would stage the morning programme, or if alumni needed to adjust their schedule and perform in the morning. Further, current students were not exactly ‘prepared’ beforehand with a programme for 1st Jan. The uncertainty loomed large even on the morning of the new year day. Beneath the happiness of being at Parthi for the New Year, undercurrents of anticipation and expectation in the third block ran through the minds of most alumni. Playing it safe, both the alumni and current student bodies sat prepared with their respective programmes, neither knowing who might be called on to perform! Did someone need to be reminded of Swami’s words ‘Love My uncertainty’?

New Year Day Celebrations: Morning

Bhagawan emerged for darshan at 8.45 am, beaming a radiantsmile. Hewasreceivedceremoniouslywitha Purna Kumbham welcome by alumni at the Yajur mandir. He smilingly acknowledged the offering and asked for the procession to begin. Indeed – alumni had planned a grand welcomeprocessionforthe Lord!

Flag boys led the procession, beginning their march with a ‘salute’ to Bhagawan. They were followed by a veda group. Two alumni took the opportunity to sprinkle rose water before Bhagawan, others held peacock and white feather fans for Him, while someone else got the chance to hold a ceremonial umbrella over the Lord. The elaborate procession added to the color and excitement felt by all in Kulwant hall.

Bhagawan came on stage and asked for the university brass band to start playing. After the band rendered a superb performance, Swami asked Shri G Venkatraman (ex-vice chancellor, SSSU) to share his thoughts with the audience. He began by welcoming alumni and jocularly added that since ‘ex-students’ had assembled in Prasanthi Nilayam, Swami had appropriately asked the ‘ex-vice chancellor’ to share his thoughts! Describing Swami’s students as the hope for a troubled world, he went on emphatically state that Swami’s message was the only solution for the worries that plague the modern world. Sri A. V. Gokak, the current Vice-Chancellor addressed the gathering next. His talk centered on the transformational work done by alumni. Vidyullekha found a place of mention in his speech – Sri Gokak described this newsletter as the ‘voice of alumni’. After this, Swami served out a wonderful surprise. He called an alumnus, a former band leader of the university brass band, and asked him, “Band leader, will you speak?”

Obviously surprised and delighted, the former band leader came up to the mike and spoke extempore. He said that speaking before Swami is like opening one’s heart to Him. Another beautiful thought he expressed was that while speaking in Bhagawan’s presence, one has to face the entire world (the audience) with the Lord on one’s side – reminding us how to think about life in the real world as well. He then went on to recollect a few experiences from his student days, and ended his speech in an ooze of gratitude for Swami. The loving Lord materialized a beautiful gold chain for him as he turned to Bhagawan for blessings.

Bhagawan then asked the current students to commence their music programme. As they bagan singing, Swami beckoned alumni holding up three colourful cakes to come close. Swami lovingly lit the candle atop each of the massive cakes, and then delicately cut them so they could be distributed as prasadam later. Following this, alumni took chances in making various other offerings to Bhagawan. Bhagawan also blessed the annual edition of Vidyullekha by accepting one copy and handed it to Prof. SV Giri (former vice-chancellor). Then He spent almost ten minutes looking through a book offering titled ‘Impressions’ – a series of articles written by alumni. After that, another alumnus offered a small  book on “Educare” to Bhagawan – a project he had been working on for the past three years.

Bhagawan then asked alumni to begin their program. The alumni music group had practiced hard, and was delighted at this chance to present an offering at the Lotus feet. The first song “Indre shubha dinamu ha ha ha” – was a throwback to Ugadi, 1985 when Swami  composed and taught the song to a few alumni – former ‘music boys’ at the time in the university.

Swami gazed intently at all alumni while listening to His composition from yesteryears. As the song concluded, Bhagawan accepted arati before getting ready to retire to His residence. Just as Bhagawan was getting into the car to retire to Yajur mandiram, a few alumni went up to Bhagawan to confirm His permission for the program planned for the evening. He approved the same and asked to hold it after ‘Rahu kalam’ (which ended at 4:30 pm that day)

New Year Day Celebrations: Evening

In the afternoon, Bhagawan arrived for darshan in His car at 4.45 pm. After reaching the stage, His eyes fell upon a bright coloured bhangra dance troupe. It was a little surprise the alumni had prepared for Him. Bhagawan called on the group to begin its performance. Interestingly, this particular dance group was not originally part of the plan for New Year Day celebrations. But on arriving at Parthi, a few alumni who remembered doing the bhangra in their student days for Bhagawan, got together and practiced a few basic steps of   the   dance.   Two   days   later,   they   stood before Bhagawan hoping to add to the festivities on New Year’s. Like a mother who sits appreciating her child mumble nursery rhymes, Swami watched indulgently as the dancers put forth a somewhat half-baked, but full-hearted performance.

To top it all, at the end of the dance Swami asked with a twinkle, “Is it over already?” There was loud laughter everywhere as Swami lovingly blessed the dancers and even spoke to many of them.

The alumni orchestra was slated to perform next. Among its most memorable pieces was one from the famous album “Vishwa Vinayaka”. After this performance, alumni presented a series of short speeches in a programme titled “In the Sunshine of Sai’s Love”. The senior most speaker of the lot was one among the first batch of twelve students to join  Bhagawan’s college in Brindavan! These recollections comprised memories of Swami’s acts of love and caring during their student years, as well as how Swami continues to make His presence felt in their lives today. During these talks, a beautiful slide show capturing such memories was presented.

As an example of Swami’s role in their present lives, an alumnus narrated how Swami appeared in his (the alumnus’) place at a client presentation, so that the alumnus could fulfill a promise made to visit with a few children at an orphanage at the same time. The speaker voiced what such a gesture of grace meant to him and others gathered there, echoing the heartfelt emotion of gratitude among the audience.

Such feeling found an equally forthcoming response from Bhagawan. In a beautiful and thrilling gesture, Bhagawan suddenly asked for the microphone – He wanted to speak! Witnessing this act of spontaneous magnanimity suffused everyone in the hall with expectation and love. Bhagawan spoke for over an hour (highlights presented in this edition’s Bhagawan Uvaacha) and concluded the discourse with the Bhajan “Hari Bhajan bina sukha shanti nahi”. Bhagawan’s talk provided a thrilling and memorable end to a wonderful New Year for alumni.

After this wondrous session with Bhagawan in the mandir, everyone assembled for an alumni body discussion at the university auditorium. The deliberations focused on ways to enhance collaboration among the alumni body and discussed ways alumni could better contribute their time towards seva activity. This session was interrupted to take a count of alumni present – because Swami had enquired about the exact number of alumni present, as well as how many had brought their families along. Swami had also been enquiring about alumni accommodation provided in the ashram. And this missive came much after Swami had retired for the evening! Even though alumni sat away from Bhagawan’s physical presence, He had found a way to reach out to and touch everyone with His tender concern even in that late hour.

January 2nd: Highlights

On the morning of 2nd Jan all alumni assembled in the early morning hours in Kulwant hall, hoping to spend as much of their time close to Bhagawan. Bhagawan came at 9:45 am and spent a lot of time with alumni. In contrast to the previous day, He chose to remain silent for the most part this morning. It felt as though He was gently showering His blessings on all alumni.

Someone went up to Swami and prayed to Him to speak to all.

“It is too large a number and there is no place” Bhagawan replied, implying the Bhajan hall was too small to accommodate all the alumni sitting for darshan.

But then, Bhagawan kindly agreed to come out and sit on the dias of Kulwant hall. Then, He began lovingly enquiring – “When are you all leaving? How many of you are going today?”

Someone prayed to Bhagawan to kindly speak to alumni again. On hearing his plea, Swami smiled and gently asked ” (After all) Whom did I speak with yesterday? What I spoke was meant for all of you. You should practice what I told you yesterday!” And then, Bhagawan sent him back with blessings.

After spending some more time thus, He asked for prasadam to be distributed and then retired to Yajur mandir. In the evening, Swami lovingly went round on his taking letters from alumni and allowed them close physical proximity. Thus ended another beautiful beginning, heralding a new year and another gorgeous chapter in the timeless saga of Bhagawan’s love for His students. A new year was welcomed with, and in, a gush of divine love. We pray that Bhagawan continues to shower His love and blessings on alumni. Even more importantly, we pray we live the message He gave to us this on the New Year day, allowing Him to guide us to the destiny He has written for each of our lives, with His own divine hands.

A Chronology of Benevolence

This year’s Alumni meet had its very own uniqueness. A very welcome one at that. Swami’s active involvement right from the word go, and the biggest congregation of alumni so far. Captured in tid-bits below are some of the behind-the-veil facets that enriched, enhanced, embellished and enlivened this year’s proceedings.

The Program Taking Flight

It is customary to seek Swami’s approval for almost every event connected with the Meet. This year, Swami showed an extra dash of interest in each of the events. In the first week of December the official tentative program was beautifully captured in a card but Swami methodically avoided the bearers of the card seated in the old students’ block. So you can imagine the surprise on their faces, when after the morning aarathi, Swami took a detour and headed for a full round of the Sai Kulwant Hall. Included in the itinerary of this beautiful detour tour was the act of blessing the card. Swami went through the contents of the card line-by-line and finally to the joy of the bearers gave an approving “Yes”. (picture of card shown to Swami enclosed) A week or so later, a card with the details of the Grama Seva (village service) was also blessed by Swami. The intent of this year’s Grama Seva was to cover a broader base of villages and make the development process self- sustaining. Grama Seva also became a platform to gather alumni scattered over the time line and gain maximum representation in these rural initiatives. This year the efforts did show positive results with alumni ranging from the most recent graduates to those belonging to the year 1968. All participated with fervor in these service activities!

Shrouds of Comfort

Another initiative that alumni undertook was that of distributing blankets amongst the homeless. This was done just as winter greeted Parthi and temperatures dropped during the nights. Alumni toured surrounding areas during nightfall and gifted these blankets along with vibhuti packets and photos of Swami to homeless people shivering on the streets.

For some alumni this seva activity hit a sweet spot on a trip down memory lane. Back in the 1980’s Swami would gather some of His students (some of these very alumni) and lead them through the streets of Parthi after nightfall during winter. Anyone shivering in cold on the streets would be a beneficiary of Swami’s munificence. Along with the blankets, Swami would ease the needy person’s anxiety with soothing words of comfort and warmth. Alumni fortunate to have accompanied Swami in those halcyon days recall fondly Swami Himself distributing the blankets and not returning until He had exhausted the entire stock. Sometimes these activities would stretch till 3am!!

There’s something else that followed these efforts – Swami’s motherly pride and encouragement. Having noted the alumni blanket distribution efforts, Swami instructed even Central Trust members to do the same. His words: “This is what my boys do. It will be good if you do the same.”

Gita Gyan, Delivered

Alumni organizers had planned to string together all the service activities being rendered by our alumni around the globe in a presentation before Bhagawan. The objective was sincere – to express our gratitude to Swami for being able to carry these activities and seek His blessings to continue the good work. Much time and effort was spent organizing and finalizing the master content that would form the basis for this presentation. Things were falling into place, but closer to the event some alumni expressed the view that this item might appear like self-glorification. Seva is best done silently, and hence the presentation was scrapped. Fair enough, but could all of this ‘behind the scenes’ thinking have escaped the watchful eye of the Lord? No one had anticipated the surprise He had planned.

A day prior to Jan 1st, the current Vice-Chancellor reached out to some of the alumni coordinators and said – “Swami wants me to talk on the service activities rendered by the alumni. Can you provide me the details?

Among other things, Bhagawan had specifically asked the Vice-Chancellor to speak about the service activities of the alumni. While the alumni team debated and discussed, Bhagawan had initiated and orchestrated a bigger drama to ensure that alumni seva activity was highlighted. The team was but an instrument and Swami the skilled Master. In one stroke, Bhagawan had acknowledged the seva work of alumni, while taking into account the feelings of those alumni who felt it would be boastful to talk of alumni seva activity. Was it Lord Krishna who had spoken of focusing on actions alone, leaving God to take care of the results, or in this case – of their presentation?

Grama Seva

Sometimes we need to put in that extra thought to recognize what efforts went in to the seemingly mundane. Of what events transpire unseen that cloak the eventful in a robe of the inane. Of what it takes to lead the various springs of enthusiasm harnessing their collective power and opening the floodgates at the right time in a surge of service. Think of the Grama Seva or the village service camp of the alumni.

Over three thousand villagers in four villages in India being served by over three hundred of us, the alumni, congregating from around the world is a strong  showing. Come to think of the planning and execution that goes into this seemingly easy event and we know we are yet again at the receiving end of Swami’s love, grace and inspiration.

Have we ever thought of these questions? How the target villages were selected? How was the mapping done between the activities and the human resources needed for these? Arranging for the supplies of the essentials like medicines, stationery and food etc. How were logistics and transport aspects of the camp managed? Each of these questions grants us a healthy new take on the huge efforts that go into conducting these camps.

Here are a few salient facts regarding about Grama Seva.

Village selection

Villages were selected based on a variety of criteria:Backward nature of the villages, particularly in terms of basic infrastructure within the village

1. Lack of proper connectivity to these villages via roads
2. Motorable distance, close to Parthi
3. A favorable clustering that facilitated a hub-and- spoke serve model on the day of the camp

After extensive surveys, the following target villages were identified- Doopampalli (as the hub), Lingappagaripalli, Yerronipalli and Yerronipalli Thaanda. Doopampalli, signifying a place of light is situated approximately 30-35 kms away from Parthi. The rest of the villages are within a 6-7 kms radius of Doopampalli. The final choice was made in consultation with village elders.

Mapping needs to seva activities

For three months leading upto D-day several studies, visits and surveys were conducted to gain insights that would guide successful implementation of the seva activity. Valuable data was gathered from the villages:

1. Village population
2. Number of school children
3. Livestock count
4. Common human and livestock diseases
5. Number of streets, their dimensions and number of houses on each of these streets
6. Number of temples, and evaluation for need of whitewash

Given all this data, every activity – narayana seva, medical seva, pallaki seva and water fluoride compounds distribution was mapped to the village requirements. Pre-camp estimates indicated that nearly three hundred alumni would be needed to conduct the seva as planned. By Swami’s grace, the necessary members showed up and there was no slack or surplus resource during the camp. Every alumnus attending the camp was able to contribute productively. The transport comprised a total of three APSRTC buses, six Mahindra vans and two Tata 407’s to ferry the participants to the villages. Temples were white washed, streets were bleached, stationery was distributed to school children, medicines were provided to patients after diagnosis, and livestock struck with disease were treated by vets. Village children were also taught simple Bhajans in a sort of Bal-Vikas quick course. Given the cooperation and enthusiasm of the villagers all around, it was no surprise that the children enjoyed themselves to the hilt as well.

On learning of Swami’s interest about the Service camp, a report was presented in the format of a card and sent to Swami for perusal at His Yajur Mandiram residence.

The conclusion couldn’t have been sweeter – we learnt Swami was visibly pleased.

A Message for Eternity

A few days after the New Year festivities, an alumnus was lucky to be called in for an interview with Bhagawan. During this interview, conversation veered to the events of the recent Alumni Meet, and Swami provided this message for all alumni:

“Tell the boys to be good and serve their parents well. They should continue to do the good work they are doing. I will guide and lead them.”

Our moment is made. The directives delivered. All we ought to do now is to tune-in to our hearts and make our every living moment a vignette of His wonderful love and grace.