Meeting Gurudev

It was the fall of 1995. My father who is a scientist is also very fond of spirituality and religious topics talks about a Gurudev near Delhi where he plans to go. His friend in the colony has been there and tells a lot about his experience in Ramghat, 135kms from Delhi in Uttar Pradesh. My father makes a weekend visit to Ramghat along with Mr. Rajpal. He comes back and tells us a lot about how he felt and what he experienced. Me, my sisters got highly curious to know more as my father told about the miraculous ability of the devotees there to communicate with deities and with spirits. We grow each minute with excitement and become desperate to go there. Since we did not have a four wheeler, the three of us, along with our father went to the Bus Terminal ISBT to catch the 8:30 am bus to Ramghat. The ticket is cheap, a journey a bit uncomfortable due to the miserable roads in UP. The trip took us 4 hours. Ramghat is located near to the famous Narora Atomic Power Station. The road becomes smooth like a carpet as you Narora. The village welcomes us with a storm of mud due to kuchha roads. Bus first goes through a narrow bridge over a tributary of River Ganges. Finally it came to a halt at the bus stop. We had no problems in reaching the Ashram as my father had already been there. There is no proper road in the whole village. Made up of bricks or mud, travelling is very inconvenient but you also get to like the smell of fresh mud. We reach the entrance to the Ashram, and noticed Gurudev is resting on the right with few people around him. He has a magnetic face with white beard, moustache and hair till his shoulders. He smiles when he sees us and people near him chorused Jai Nanua Ki (Praise Nanua). We also replied and our father asked us to touch his feet to show our respect. He welcomed us and gave a warm thumping on our back. He addressed my father as Doctor Saheb, what brings you here again. My father replied, I was grateful to have a chance to meet you and the children also got highly interested in meeting you. Nanua laughed and replied what do you find in this backward village. He asks our names, my sister Aparna, Pragya and me Bhuvanesh. He admires what beautiful names and asks us about what we are doing. Then he gets up and goes inside the room. Meanwhile the people sitting there comment, you have arrived at the right place, he has the solution to everyone's problems.
Nanua returns with steel glasses in his hands. It had tea in them. He distributes tea among us and takes one for himself. He asks one of the men sitting to ignite incense sticks. He asks him to find who is the Ishta Deva of three of us. Istha is supposed to be the Hindu God/Goddess who is responsible for our birth.We must worship our Istha Deva for best results and propserity. The man closes his eyes and starts to concentrate. He replies, Nanua, for Aparna, Goddess Kali has arrived. For Pragya, Goddess Durga and for Bhuvanesh Lord Hanuman. Nanua smiles and asks us who do we usually worship at home. I replied that I have always worshipped Hanuman on Tuesdays and Saturdays. My sisters also replied that not in any particular routine, but they worship Goddess Durga. Nanua smiles, and says very nice and asks the man, ask them why are the children suffering and what reasons are there for there problems. The man replied Nanua, I can see their sins. I can see an old lady weeping and bent due to a back pain for Aparna. Nanua asks what is she saying. Man: she says I was her mother in law and she threw me out of the house and beat me with sticks. I died in all pain. Nanua says, that was a different birth now this child is ignorant of her sin and forgive her. Nanua asks my sister to ask for forgiveness. Nanua asks the man, what is the old lady asking for. Man replied, she wants food in thali and a sari and is pointing to her back. Nanua lifts his hand and says, Nanua please mend her broken back and give her peace. He asks my sister to grab a thali from inside put some food in it from the kitchen and hands her a white saari. When she returns, Nanua asks her to offer this all to the old lady and ask for forgiveness. The man replied, Nanua she is eating, has taken the saari and is going.
Nanua explains, you see how sins are affecting us. That lady from a previous birth has been suffering waiting for her salvation and is causing troubles in Aparna's life to take her revenge.This is all a game of revenge. Give and Take. You harm someone, and it will come back to you. Across births, sins are carried and will not leave you until they find peace. It was a practical demonstration of the immortality of the soul as mentioned in BhagvadGita and our scriptures. Nanua says, Man has fourteen human births to reach his goal, to again mix into God and then a cycle of 8.4 million species. Each birth, is defined by the deeds in the previous.
Nanua asked us to prepare for a bath in Ganges. This was a must for all arrivees. We carried our clothes and walked along with Nanua towards Ganges. The path leads from within the village market where most of the shops are selling either sweets or material useful for worship for River Ganges. There are many festivals throughout the year when people from nearby villages come to Ramghat for a dip in the Ganges and worship. Ramghat is unique in the confluence of multiple tributaries of Ganges. The main Ganges is the Ram Ganga coming from Haridwar. A tributary known as Baan Ganga meets this flow at Ramghat.
We purchased sweets, fresh milk and powdered sugar from the market. On reaching Ganges, Nanua asks us to ignite incense sticks to meditate on Mother Ganges and offer her sweets. She will wash us of our sins of eating onion/garlic. It is believed eating Onion/Garlic is not advisable as it leads to impure thoughts. Nanua also explained that Onion is composed of shells and a vey thin fibrous layer in between which does not get digested in the body. These minute pieces of the fibre get settled on the blood capillcaries and slows down the blood flow. This over long duration gives rise to various diseases. By offering milk to Ganga, we can wash away our sins and find solace. The dip was soothing. We felt very light and relaxed. Nanua teaches us we should not make Ganga impure and never urinate. River is sacred and considered full of life. Upon impuring it, we invite body diseases and pain.
We can also relate this to keeping our water bodies clean as its the lifeline of any civilization.
We returned from the trip back to the Ashram. Nanuaji reminds us to be cautious with our belongings as monkeys are very mischievous. After settling down, we start asking questions from the people sitting around while Nanua gets some barley flour and kneads it. He himself prepared chapatis on a steel tava heated by wood logs. He offers the chapatis to us along with Spicy spinach dish. Food is delicious and I am amazed by his down-to-earth nature and hospitality. After eating we all wash our utensils with sand. Nanua asks us to take a nap to get some rest. After waking up, it is getting dark, there is a distant sound of music in the local village dialect. The birds are returning to their nests on the tamarind tree above us and there is lot of noise from monkeys fighting and running atop us on the teenshade. Nanua is talking to some local villagers and discussing their problems. A man has come from the village on the other side of Ganga and is complaining that his buffalo is not giving milk. Villagers are generally farmers or milkman and that is their bread and butter. Buying a buffalo is costly and he will not get any money if he doesn't sell the milk every morning in the local market. Such problems seem trivial but poor people's lives revolve around them. They are usually illiterate. Nanua asks him to ignite three incense sticks in front of the buffalo, meditate upon Nanua and ask to make it healthy and fit.
Nanua offers him food and sweets for his children. The man goes with hope. Nanua is preparing the havan kund( fire place for worship). He places cow dung cakes and wood logs and ignites. He asks us to come near the kund and take havan samagri( made from cow dung powder, wood, spices) to offer to fire on mantra. Fire is the most sacred forms of matter and is believed the medium to offer food to the deities. Ghee( butter from cow/buffaloe) is also used. Nanua explains, it is not just the Gods/Goddesses that are to be pleased, you also have to please your sins, the unsatisfied souls through this medium. Nanua chants the mantra and we offer the samagri in fire.
After finishing all the samagri we wash our hands, distribute the remaining sweets in between all people sitting and get back to Nanua. Nanua is relaxing on a jute bed and a devotee is massaging his feet.
Nanua says, the world is busy in worshipping all gods/goddesses forgetting that they are themselves one. We all are Gods, we are the characters of Ramayana, Mahabharata. Its that we have forgotten our self that we are suffering. And in the worshipping no one realises the inportance of sins. They are actually to be worshipped. No God/Goddess can come near you, can help you when you have a sin upon you. That dissatisfied soul has the priority to complete its balance from you. That is the law of the nature. As you convict a criminal of an offence/crime, so does the law judges you for the solution/judgement. You may get saved by worship, your saviour God may protect you from complete ruin, but only till an extent. They are also helpless in front of the sin as its the law. So you must also worship your sins as you worship all deities, since if they will be satisfied, peace will automatically come to you.
And what role do I play for you, I am Chaprasi ( peon). Like a peon sits at the door of an officer and a visitor has to ask him to meet the officer, similarly I am the medium to communicate with the higher world. Nothing more. And what does Nanua mean? It means Om, the most common name in Hindus. If you write Nanua in Hindi with the alphabets on top of other, it becomes Om. In the same way, writing Chaprasi makes Shree, also symbolic of divinity. So Om becomes the soul and Shree becomes the Body. It is the combined role of the body and the soul to complete the journey towards the salvation.Myself as Nanua is just a human being, the universal Nanua which exists in all of us, like Om, is the ultimate saviour. All Gods/Goddesses are also limited forms of Om, like all of us, but the omnipresent, the ever vibrant in all life and universe is Om, Nanua.