A Tale of two deaths
A controversial character in his lifetime he symbolised India. In 1940, when he was 14 years old, Satya Sai Baba suddenly declared that he was the re- incarnation of Sai Baba (Shirdi) who had died 8 years before.
He didn't believe in any particular one God, only preached the existence of the one. His website synopsises his beliefs as:
- Believe in God --for there is only ONE GOD for all mankind, though He may be called by many names.
- Follow sincerely their respective religions and live their daily lives in consonance with the teachings of good behavior and morality.
- Respect all other religions --for no religion advocates the negative and lower qualities of man.
- Perform selfless service to the poor, the sick, and the needy without thought of reward or fame.
- Cultivate in their lives the values of truth, divine love, right conduct, peace, and nonviolence and promote these values among all.
- Be patriotic and respect the laws of the country in which they live.
All excellent rules to live by. Some called him a faker, a charlatan due to his penchant for pulling objects of of mid air. A couple of exposes have been done on him which show some possible sleight of hand. ( click here for one such video)
My belief is someone who can give succour to so many, to bring balm to hearts of millions cannot be all bad. Its our fault that we do not believe that a holy man can be ordinary. For a man to be godly, we expect him to create miracles. Well the public got what they wanted.
When asked why did he do miracles, his explanation was simple and very revealing. He stated that he produced objects and tokens (lockets, rings, vibhuti, etc) so that people would carry them around with them. According to him. when in trouble , those objects would act as concentrators and would channel their please to wherever he was……..Not a bad concept if you wish to believe in something.
Human beings need a hook to hang their hat on, need a reason to believe that their troubles will be over soon, be it the belief that Sai Baba is there to look after them to wave his hand and their problems will disappear.
In todays troubled times with pressures building through the roof and life running in the fast lane, any belief helps. When a person affects the lives of so many in such a positive manner he will definitely be sorely missed by his followers. I sympathise with their loss of a father.
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All the press coverage of the Kate-William wedding in Britain reminds me of a second tragic death in 1997.
I was in the UK and couldn't sleep. So I made myself a drink and was watching the TV in front of the sofa when I fell asleep. I woke up at about 3 am to screaming sirens and howling French words on the TV. My sleep befuddled brain took about 3-4 minutes before the news finally sunk in.
Diana the princess was dead.
She who had captured the heart of millions. The darling of a generation. The TV presenter had a lump in his throat and his eyes welled up.
- She reflected the dreams of every young girl who wishes a prince to sweep her off her feet.
- She became the image of every woman who slowly falls out of love with her husband and his philandering.
- She epitomised the battered woman fighting against a powerful in law family.
- She was the pictograph of a divorced frustrated woman looking for love in one wrong man after another.
My mind ran over the change of a young vibrant woman from a dreamy eyed young girl with flashing eyes to a sad troubled middle aged woman with her haunted look just before she died.
I don't know about the others but I for one my friends cried that night.
Heres to to Diana - The eternal candle in the wind ( click here for Elton John's tribute to Diana)
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let me introduce myself:
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I am an person of Indian origin residing in Mumbai who feels that the time has come to speak up or be silent forever. We all see movies like Rang De Basanti or Lage Raho Munnabhai and after walking out of theatre for the next couple of days the effect hangs like a halo around us. A few days later we go back to our old ways. This is my way of keeping the spirit of India alive.
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As they say" 100 mein se 99% beimaan phir be India hai Mahaan"
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