Amitabh Das Gupta
1999 Prasanthi Nilayam
It was a pleasant evening in April 1994 at Kodaikanal. As a school student, I had been fortunate to be a part of the group that accompanied Bhagawan. After the evening session with Him, we were summoned for dinner at 7.00pm. Bhagawan as usual was overseeing all arrangements, making sure all were comfortably seated around the dinner table. Swami had His back towards the table talking to a senior devotee while Swami’s chef was serving Him – His meagre dinner of two chapattis. There was a slip on the chef’s part – one chapatti fell off the plate on to the floor on which all the boys and guests walk over all the time. There was a sudden hush and the chef was embarrassed by his folly. As he tried to pick it up and replace it with a new one, the compassionate Lord immediately turned around, took the inconvenience to bend down and picked up the fallen chapatti and put it back on to His plate and remarked, “I will have that chapatti only”.
He continued to converse with the senior devotee with his back against his table. In the meanwhile, a student, seizing a moment when Swami was not physically noticing him, went quietly from behind and replaced the fallen chapatti with a fresh one. Swami finished the conversation. He hadn’t noticed the student, but went back to the student and asked him to put back the original fallen chapatti back in His plate. He had His way and ate that fallen chapatti for dinner.
As an onlooker, I was rooted to the spot observing this. Most people would throw away the chapatti on contact with the floor. Could we follow this example? What was He trying to teach us?
A week later I was serving chapattis to a senior devotee during dinner and Swami was standing in front of me and observing. There was a lapse of concentration on my part and I fumbled and a chapatti dropped out of the plate on to the table. There was no compassion this time. He came down on me with like a ton of bricks. This time the chapatti was not reinstated. It was replaced.
Now what was He trying to teach us? Was it to pick up and eat fallen chapattis, which was most visible to the naked eye that evening or was He teaching us how to serve a guest… or was He teaching us a far greater truth that I didn’t get till many years later?
After so many years, one fine morning, the penny dropped. The incident became crystal clear. It was a lesson for me that if you have offered yourself to GOD, it doesn’t matter if you fall and are trampled by others, He will pick you up, embrace you and lift you to the heavens because you fell for Him like the chapatti He was served. Whereas, the chapatti which I served was not for Swami, but for the guest and it was picked up, not to be replaced, but thrown away.
Great Masters don’t teach things just directly. They work on us patiently. He must be smiling now thinking finally that I got the message after so many years!
Brother Amitabh is working in Melbourne, Australia as a manager in an IT / consulting global firm. He joined the primary school in 1982 and went on to do his MBA from Prashanti Nilayam. He also served in the ashram for few years post his studies.