Loving God

By Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba

This is the biography of Professor N. Kasturi, the chosen biographer of Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba. This book is his autobiography, his story, his journey to the feet of the Lord, Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba.

In his own words, "Each of us has to live the volume of biography, which we bring with us, as often as we are born, page after page, chapter after chapter, howsoever punctuated with dots and dashes, interrogations and exclamations, commas and colons, until the sentence ends ultimately with a Full Stop. But, luckily, I have as my inseparable companion and counsel, Bhagawan Himself; He dots the i’s and crosses the t’s as I live the lines on every page. He has made the Book of Life, my biography – momentous and meaningful for me. I must, however, confess that I do not deserve this book on me, by me. There are, I know, millions, who are absorbing the Love of the Living Loving God much deeper, who can, therefore, stand forth as messengers of His Love. They can lead the unloved and the unloving with surer and firmer steps, to the Presence of the Redeemer, the Comforter, the Saviour, the Avatar, the Sai. Nevertheless, when Bhagawan manifested a faint, favourable interest, when someone ventured to whisper to me in His Presence, that a bunch of my reminiscences may be welcomed by many, I was promoted by that smile to embark on this audacious adventure. My memory assumed the role of Chief Editor and hence, the chronicle suffers from imperfect chronology. Since the four parts of 'Sathyam Sivam Sundram' relate most of that I have yearned to communicate, this book has become a personal testament, often perhaps too personal to be tolerated, for which act of indiscretion, I ask for pardon.

Flattery is the food of fools, say those, who are denied that pabulum. I dare not deny my taste, for I have been fooled by flatterers, who threw appellations like poet, scholar, linguist, humourist, philosopher, and even ant-hill sage! Please dear reader, remember that I am struggling my best to eliminate the poison of the ego and sympathise with me, whenever you find the reptile raising its hood between the lines of this book. A few ‘old students’ of my classes at the University, my grandson, his wife, and a few brothers at Prasanthi Nilayam demanded that I should not give up the work and insisted on the completion of the book. As a result, this book, ‘Loving God’ is now placed at the Feet of the Lord and on the palms of those, who live in the Love of the Lord. Jai Sai Ram."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sri Sathya Sai Sadhana Trust, Publications Division
• Release date: Jul 30, 2014
• ISBN: 9789350690932

Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba

Sri Sathya Sai Baba was born as Sathyanarayana Raju on November 23rd, 1926 in the village of Puttaparthi, in the state of Andhra Pradesh in South India. Even as a child, His spiritual inclination and contemplative nature set Him apart from other children of His age, and He was known as 'Guru' and "Brahmajnani' among His peers and others in the village. On October 20th, 1940, He made the historic declaration of His Avatarhood and the world at large learnt of this divine phenomenon. Today, millions of devotees worship Him as an 'Avatar' and an incarnation of the Sai Baba of Shirdi.Revealing the purpose of His Advent, Sai Baba has said that He has come to re-establish the rhythm of righteousness in the world and repair the ancient highway to God, which over the years has systematically deteriorated.Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba is an integral manifestation who combines two very significant roles. Firstly, He is a great spiritual Master, famed for His simple and sweet exposition of the greatest and most intricate of spiritual truths which form the fundamental teachings of all the religions of the world. His formula for man to lead a meaningful life is the five-fold path of Sathya, Dharma, Shanthi, Prema, and Ahimsa. Love for God, fear of sin and morality in society - these are His prescriptions for our ailing world.Secondly, He is an inexhaustible reservoir of pure love. His numerous service projects, be it free hospitals, free schools and colleges, free drinking water supply or free housing projects, all stand testimony to His selfless love and compassion for the needy and less privileged. True to His declaration - "My Life is My Message", He has inspired and continues to inspire millions of His devotees worldwide by His personal example to live the ideal that service to man is service to God.Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba is a beacon of hope in the world. A devotee said, "Bhagawan Baba is nothing but Love walking on two feet."

Book preview

Loving God

Eighty Five Years Under The Watchful Eye Of The Lord

Chronicled By

N. Kasturi

Sri Sathya Sai Sadhana Trust, Publications Division

Prasanthi Nilayam - 515 134

Anantapur District, Andhra Pradesh, INDIA

STD: 08555 ISD: 91-8555 Phone: 287375 Fax: 287236

E-mail: [e-mail]

Website: www.srisathyasaipublications.org, www.sanathanasarathi.org, www.saireflections.org

© Sri Sathya Sai Sadhana Trust, Publications Division; All rights reserved.

The copyright and the rights of translation in any language are reserved by the Publishers. No part, passage, text or photograph or artwork of this book should be reproduced, transmitted or utilised, in original language or by translation, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photo copying, recording or by any information, storage and retrieval system without the express and prior permission, in writing from the Convener, Sri Sathya Sai Sadhana Trust, Publications Division, Prasanthi Nilayam, Andhra Pradesh India - Pin Code 515134, except for brief passages quoted in book review.

This e-book is commercially licensed for you only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

First Edition: 30th July, 2014 (30/07/2014)

ISBN: 978-93-5069-093-2

Paperback ISBN: 978-81-7208-719-7

Published By

The Convener,

Sri Sathya Sai Sadhana Trust, Publications Division

Prasanthi Nilayam, India, Pin Code – 515134

STD : 08555 ISD: 91-8555 Phone: 287375 Fax: 287236

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Just A Word

Each of us has to live the volume of biography, which we bring with us, as often as we are born, page after page, chapter after chapter, howsoever punctuated with dots and dashes, interrogations and exclamations, commas and colons, until the sentence ends ultimately with a Full Stop. But, luckily, I have as my inseparable companion and counsel, Bhagawan Himself; He dots the i’s and crosses the t’s as I live the lines on every page. He has made the Book of Life, my biography – momentous and meaningful for me.

I must, however, confess that I do not deserve this book on me, by me. There are, I know, millions, who are absorbing the Love of the Living Loving God much deeper, who can, therefore, stand forth as messengers of His Love. They can lead the unloved and the unloving with surer and firmer steps, to the Presence of the Redeemer, the Comforter, the Saviour, the Avatar, the Sai.

Nevertheless, when Bhagawan manifested a faint, favourable interest, when someone ventured to whisper to me in His Presence, that a bunch of my reminiscences may be welcomed by many, I was promoted by that smile to embark on this audacious adventure. My memory assumed the role of Chief Editor and hence, the chronicle suffers from imperfect chronology. Since the four parts of Sathyam Sivam Sundram relate most of that I have yearned to communicate, this book has become a personal testament, often perhaps too personal to be tolerated, for which act of indiscretion, I ask for pardon.

Flattery is the food of fools, say those, who are denied that pabulum. I dare not deny my taste, for I have been fooled by flatterers, who threw appellations like poet, scholar, linguist, humourist, philosopher, and even ant-hill sage!

Please dear reader, remember that I am struggling my best to eliminate the poison of the ego and sympathise with me, whenever you find the reptile raising its hood between the lines of this book.

A few ‘old students’ of my classes at the University, my grandson, his wife, and a few brothers at Prasanthi Nilayam demanded that I should not give up the work and insisted on the completion of the book.

As a result, this book, ‘Loving God’ is now placed at the Feet of the Lord and on the palms of those, who live in the Love of the Lord. Jai Sai Ram.

N.Kasturi

Christmas Day

Prasanthi Nilayam, 1982

Contents

Preface

1. The Shower of Pearls

2. Grandfather’s Darling

3. Paramahamsa’s Ward

4. Academic Adventures

5. Disaster And Deliverance

6. Wedded For Life

7. Appetising Adjacency

8. Farewell To Pain

9. Penance For Pen

10. Love On The Move

11. My Translation

12. His Story--The History

13. Toning Up Temples

14. The Chiselled Child

15. The Loving God

1. The Shower Of Pearls

This time, I inhaled the Breath of God on Christmas Day, 1897. Baba says, A person is born to learn how not to be born again. The secret for achieving this goal had eluded me, during earlier appearances and so, I had to be put to school again. In my long journey from amoeba to anthropos, I had learnt little of the alphabet of liberation, not even A for Atma! Therefore, I arrived at a Hindu household, on Christmas night, near the shore of the Arabian Sea, helpless, as always, poking and pushing at the prospect of another sojourn on Earth.

The day I was born, half the globe was lit with adoration for the Son of God. Was it a reward for some notable deed of merit, during my last halt here? Or, was it an omen for my own resurrection? I dare not doubt. The past inevitably shapes the present and the future, too, shapes the present with equal inevitability. Very often, the pull of the future is more decisive than the pressure of the past. Tomorrow’s tree is packed in today’s seed, as truly as today’s seed resulted from yesterday’s tree. The Gita was spoken to mould a Gandhi centuries later. Patent Be-coming needs Latent Be-ing.

Birth on Christmas Day presaged a shining page in my book of life. I left the village, where I was born, in 1919 and re-entered it only in 1968, with Baba, whom thousands of Christians from many lands adore on Christmas Day, as He, who sent His only Son to save mankind. And the purpose of Baba’s visit was to bless a Christian devotee and lay the foundation stone for a Temple he was erecting for Him. It is a story, revealing the glory of Baba and the piety of Elias. Elias was attracted to a house, six miles away, where Baba’s will was showering the sacred, curative ash (Vibhuti) – which He often creates by a wave of His Hand – from His portrait (!) and to the surprise of all, from the portrait of Jesus Christ as well. He went; he saw; he was thrilled. He had heard that Baba was a ‘Hindu’. He knew Baba was hundreds of miles away. He witnessed the working of the Divine Will. He realised that the One answers to any name, pronounced in any language. He decided to build a temple, dedicated to His ‘Christ come again’ as the Comforter (Sai) with the name of Truth (Sathya), wearing a blood-red robe, as revealed to St. John.

Baba brought me in the Impala, to my village and stayed at the Christian home. The ‘Sermon on the Mount’ was delivered from the terrace of that home. While mounting the steps, He waved His palm and created a lovely Cross for a Christian, the Minister of Health, Kerala State. The terrace commanded a view of the football field of the High School, my dearest alma mater. That evening, the field was a vast garden of flushed faces and glistening eyes. I could spot a dozen of my contemporaries, squatting serenely on the front line of listeners.

Roll up thy bed and follow Me was the text, again. He directs us thus in His infinite compassion, to lift ourselves from the bed of disease, on which we gasp and groan, wriggle and toss, and walk on the foot-prints of the Saviour. I had the rare pleasure of translating His Discourse into Malayalam, the language of Kerala. Not that He needed an interpreter. All tongues are activated by Him. He willed to present me, as a son of that village and to grant me that pleasure, that day; that was all. When I failed to bring up quickly, from memory, an appropriate Malayalam word, for I was away from the region for more than three decades, He helped me through! When I dropped an adjective or an adjuration of His, He came to the rescue of the listeners with a word they knew!

Myself And Wife Anointing Avatar On Advent Day

The village of Tripunittura has, as its heart, a temple, wherein according to tradition, Arjuna had installed an idol of Vishnu (Narayana), who, when in human incarnation as Krishna, served as his charioteer, during the eighteen-day battle on the Kurukshetra field. Since the reins He held guided not only the horses, but also Arjuna through the twists and turns, the challenges and churns, the angers and agonies of battle, Krishna was acclaimed, after this unique act of gracious service to a supplicant, as Parthasarathi (the Charioteer of Partha, Partha being another name, by which Arjuna was known).

On the eleventh day of my earthly career, my mother fondly carried me, as custom commanded, to the temple and placed me on the stone slab under the big lamp, hanging in front of the shrine of Parthasarathi. She watched the face of the idol for a sign of benediction. The flames on the lamps to the right and left flickered a moment. She treasured in her heart the smile that the idol then conveyed; she brought me home, quite content. Thereafter, she carried me every morning to the temple, until I could be allowed to walk alone and recite a few propitiatory psalms, which would draw Parthasarathi’s grace on me. I could then receive from the priest a pinch of wet sandal paste, to be worn on my forehead and a spoonful of sanctified water to cleanse my interior.

My grandfather was the Karyakar, or the Executive of the Temple. He brought home, every night, after locking the door of the shrine, his share of the ‘food offerings’ placed before the Lord twice a day. We kept awake, until he arrived; I got the ‘lion cub’s share’ of the soul sustaining, sweet rice, which Parthasarathi sent me.

The temple lay athwart the road I had later to take to reach the free ‘eating-house’ and my school. I stood, every day, in front of Parthasarathi, telling Him with tears and sobs, sighs and signals, my fears and feelings, complaints and conquests, until the flickering lamps projected on the idol’s countenance the semblance of an assuring and appreciative smile. I prayed to Him to make my food tasty and persuade the Manager of the ‘eating house’ to give me, every day, a few more mouthfuls. I prayed for pencils and peppermints. I prayed that I may arrive at the correct answer, while working out arithmetical problems at the too frequent tests at school. I prayed to Him to postpone the Viceregal visit to our village, until I got a coat to wear, for without it, I could not stand with my schoolmates on the kern and get a near view of the procession. Parthasarathi was my guide, my friend, my confessor, my confederate, my companion, and even my ‘bed-fellow’ when I was in dreamland.

Baba declares Himself to be the Krishna incarnation of God and the Parthasarathi depicted in the ancient, Indian epic. He announces that He is the Sarathi or the Charioteer, the Guide and the Path-finder of every living being, since life awakened in earthly matter, that is, since Sanathana days. He says, He is the ‘Sanathana Sarathi’, the Universal, Eternal Charioteer. Buddhist texts affirm that ‘trishna’ (Inner Thirst) has incalculable potency. "Trishna yearns to see and we have eyes! It wants to hear and we have ears! The plant yearns to bloom; we have flowers all around us. I yearned since childhood for Parthasarathi and I secured the Sanathana Sarathi" at the age of fifty. Coming events can be known by their rumblings, years ahead. In 1957, when I was sixty years ‘old’, my Parthasarathi nominated me as the Editor of ‘Sanathana Sarathi’, to hold the pen that limns the pages of that magazine with the Gita He has come to teach.

Grannie was disappointed when she, as mid-wife to her younger daughter, held me in her arms and looked at me through the first pair of eyes to welcome me, on my present journey. I was too frail a child to thrill her heart with hope. Even without weighing me, she found me wanting.

Father was 18 and mother 12, when Vedic rites invoked the God of Fire to witness their wedding. Mother told me her companions, who sat around her that sunny morning, refrained from congratulating her, for they saw that father was as dark as the pupil of his eye and mother was as white as the rest of the same eye (Her eyes were feline). Grannie passed over my complexion; it did not worry her, for I was masculine; but, she was concerned over my avoirdupois. She doted over plump, pumpkin, human calves, the ones that stare at us from baby food cans. She tried diverse drugs, oils, massages, and vegetable concoctions for months; I resolutely refused to bloat.

I posed another problem to test grannie’s intelligence and tolerance. I paraded a few extra appendages, when I descended on the world, which she snipped with a pair of scissors, unceremoniously and rather amateurishly! No. The vestigial tail was not the problem. It was tucked as usual out of sight; but, I had six fingers on each palm and six toes on each foot, though the superfluous digits were only tentative and non-functional. The nails were there on the tips, but the tips hung loose on a length of ligament. When, lying on back, I waved my arms or shook my fists, when I curled my legs and kicked the air, the boneless toes and fingers dangled in glee, but did not hurt me. But, Grannie was hurt. When Grannie rejoiced at the finish of her surreptitious surgery, mother shed tears over her irreligious and even calamitous act. The extra fingers and toes, however elementary, were considered signs of good luck by those, who believe in astrology and folk-lore. Grannie had not heard the story and she, too, wept in repentance. The silver spoon was thus plucked out of my mouth, in a fit of foolishness, by the very person most interested in my career.

Grannie’s intention was free from fault, but the scissors were not. So, the slits became septic and within two weeks of my arrival on earth, I had to travel a few paces into the realm of death. As anthropologists say, during crisis, man regresses into the past, the primitive, and even the prehistoric. Grannie discovered that our ancestors worshipped the Lord of Seven Holy Hills as their guardian Deity and discovering a pilgrim, who was bound to that shrine, she sent with him a few coins to offer a silver finger there, in order to seek pardon for her hasty crime and save my life. Her prayer was answered; the silver did the job. I recovered soon from the scissorian operation. My girth too soon pleased kith and kin. They ascribed it to grace from God Venkateshwara of the Seven Hills.

In fact, Venkateshwara, adored by millions for centuries, is Bhagawan Baba Himself. Years later, I saw it with my own eyes. It is a long story, but I must come out with it now, at this juncture. When I transcended my teenage, I went up the Hills on a thanks giving trek and prostrated before the shrine. Later, I climbed them, step by step, along the winding stairs of stone, with my baby son astride my neck. We had vowed to shave his natal hair on that Holy spot and place him on the temple floor, so that he may be blessed by the benedictive glance of the Compassionate Lord. Ten years later, I went up to the shrine to initiate the son into the sacred Gayatri Mantram, in the Divine Presence. I had named him Venkata Narayana, in order that the Lord’s name be on our tongues and in his memory. I named his younger brother Venkata Adri (the Holy Hill of Venkateshwara), for the same reason. Twelve years later, I trudged up the incline to the height, where the Lord stood, with my son and his wife. Venkateshwara and the shrine on the Hills were carved deep in our hearts. We and thousands of others in Kerala lighted lamps to glorify Him, read stories evidencing His mercy, and sung songs invoking Him. Years rolled by. When I was accepted into the Presence of Baba, the urge to retain contact with the Holy Hill subsided, though a sense of guilt, as if I was playing truant or malingering, jabbed my conscience, whenever I passed along the highway skirting the Hill and caught a glimpse through the car window of the festoons of twinkling lights that adorned the stairway up the cliffs.

For over fifteen years, I turned my face away, hoping that I was not noticed. Then, one day, I bared my heart to Baba and pleaded for blessings upon a belated pilgrimage. Baba said, You can go. But, whom will you see there? I answered, You. Baba nodded ascent, Go and be happy.

When I persuaded my septuagenarian knees to carry me over the steps, many of them proverbially knee-high, they obeyed without murmur, since Baba had said, Go. At the shrine, it happened as I had anticipated and as He willed. The imposing, bejewelled idol of Vishnu gave place to Baba, who stood on the spot, smiling at me, eyebrows raised as if surprised to see me standing there!

On the twelfth morning of my life, a label was attached to me amidst a great deal of religious noise. My father saw me for the first time only then, when he came to name me. The name, which has stuck to me ever since, was an ancient one, much the brighter, because it was borne by a series of grandfathers. The rule was that the first son must be named by the father after his own father. So, I was given by father the name his father bore. My first son was named Narayana by me, because that was the name my father had. Father took me from mother’s hands and sat on the floor, facing the family shrine with me on his lap. He prayed to God to bless the name and help me to add some more fragrance to it. Then, he raised me by the shoulders to his face and whispered thrice, in my right ear, a long string of strange sounds, by which I was to be known thereafter. It was a nine-syllabled rodomontade. I had tumbled into the Brahmin caste and so, the last two syllables had to be Sharma, symbolising that status. The rest of the name, Kasturiranganatha, indicated neither the God idolised in my village, nor the God installed on the Seven Hills. It denoted God, as adored by millions in Tamil Nadu, installed in a reclining posture, on a multi-hooded, many-coiled serpent and described by that name as, musk-dot adorned. Kasturi means ‘musk’, ‘ranga’ means ‘stage’, and ‘natha’ means ‘director’, or ‘master’. The temple of Ranganatha with the Kasturi dot is situated on an island, called Sri Ranga (The Stage), in the Kaveri River, formed by it while half-way from the Mysore Plateau to the Bay of Bengal.

The substance called musk is valued as a precious perfume. Since it is also dark in colour, a dot of musk between the brows serves to ward off the evil eye. It was preferred by nobles and princesses over cheaper contrivances. The brow of the idol at Srirangam was marked with the Kasturi dot, for nothing less could satisfy the devout worshipers. The name, Director of the Stage reminds us that ‘All the world is a stage’. God directs the cosmic play, unaffected Himself. He reclines magnificently on terror and poison, with His head on a pillow of calm. His will achieves, and motivates. The Katha Upanishad declares, Seated, He journeys; reclining, He is everywhere.

Kasturi Ranganatha Sharma was too long a word to be uttered in full, every time I was spoken of or to. The caste symbol ‘Sharma’ could be painlessly amputated. The rest, too, had to be curtailed, but the problem was, head or tail? My grandfather was accosted and referred to, by all who had to deal with him, only as Ranganatha and for the daughter-in-law (my mother) to mouth the name of the father-in-law was taboo! So, the second half had to be jettisoned. The result was, I came to be known as the fragrant, animal substance used for ‘dotting’ the Divine Brow.

I could stand with folded hands in the presence of the Kasturi Ranganatha, only in my 70th year! It came about through Baba’s Grace. Friends invited me to a town, called Tirupur to speak on Baba, on the 24th day of December. And Baba directed me to go. But, I longed to spend Christmas Day with Baba, since it reminded me of my entry into the world stage. I asked permission to go over from Tirupur to Srirangam and worship Him in the Ranganatha, reclining on the serpent. The serpent, Baba says, is symbolic of pollution, poison, and death and God is pictured as overwhelming, quietening, and mastering these evil traits. Baba said, Yes. Go to Sri Rangam and eat your fill of sweet rice. The reference to sweet rice did not surprise me. Years previous, when we were proceeding to Madras, Baba, as was His wont, asked every single person in the car to sing for Him a song. My genes had no music among their components, but I had to obey, nevertheless. Memory brought up for me a song I had heard a clown sing, during a play I chanced to attend while at school. It was a prayer to Shiva for a morsel of sweet rice, wrung out of a hungry onlooker at a feast conspicuously consumed by the rich. Baba must have discovered that my subconscious had hooked up this particular lilt, for the reason that I myself had an unfulfilled hunger for this dish, deep within me! He decided to remove that pang at Srirangam, on my 70th Birthday.

I was thrilled, when I stood before the shrine and filled my eyes and heart with the entrancing vision of the 20 foot idol, stretched on the coils of a seven-hooded serpent, exuding captivating iconocharm. To my eyes, the Feet, the upraised soles were not of dark green stone as the rest of the Divine Body was. They were alabaster with a shade of blue. They were soft, tender, fair, familiar, and alive; they were Baba’s! I removed myself away from the portals of the shrine with great reluctance. Sweet rice was, I believed, the routine offering at Ranganatha shrine, but that day, we were given only laddus and muruks.

We had one more temple to visit on that holy island-a famous Shiva temple with the sacred Jambu Tree. When we moved out of that temple, the priest ran behind us to announce that it was specially sacred day, when, Sweet rice was offered to the deity. This was welcome news indeed. He insisted on our turning back into the temple. He made us squat on the clean floor to the right of the shrine; he spread banana leaves before us and served sizeable heaps of the dish Baba had asked me to ‘eat my fill’.

Father was the youngest of four sons. He and his parents were living in an isolated village, 30 miles to the east of the place, where mother grew up. His forefathers had fled before the horsemen of Tippu Sultan of Mysore, from the Palghat Gap, which was wrested by him from the East India Company, into the kingdom of the Maharaja of Travancore, who halted the depredators.

When father became the son-in-law of grannie and grandfather, mother’s elder brothers - there were three of them - decided to provide for him means of subsistence, closer to Tirupunittura. One of the three was the amanuensis and conscience-keeper of a prosperous Advocate of the High Court of the Maharaja of Cochin, situated seven miles away, at a town named Ernakulam. Swami Vivekananda, while on his way to Cape Comorin (Kanyakumari), as part of his project to probe into the material and spiritual poverty of his fellowmen, had stayed at this lawyer’s bungalow for a day.

Walking along the mosaic floor of the busy corridors of the Cochin High Court, with his brother-in-law, and watching the string of vendors selling Stamp Paper and writing legal documents for clients, father had a brilliant idea. He would be a stamp vendor and document writer, both.

Father, being the youngest son, was an unused stepney in the family business of agriculture; the elder brothers did all the watching of the clouds for rain and all the scratching of the soil for the sowing that was needed for the procurement of paddy. He longed for the free and open life of the seashore. He yearned to look beyond the turmoil of waves towards the western sky, where the sun hastens for his evening dip in the cauldron of gold. Uncle fed fervour to his fancy. The Advocate, whom he served with a loyalty approaching servility, blessed the venture. He promised to direct his clients to father and secure for him the licence necessary for the trade.

Father was a commendable calligraphist. People wondered whether he held a quill or a brush. He could write, page after page of legal mumbo-jumbo, in the only script he knew, Malayalam. He sold off his share of the patrimony for whatever it could fetch, to wit, a few hundred rupees and placed the sum in the hands of my eldest uncle for safe keeping. He never got it back. The loss of that fortune haunted my mother and her parents, for many a long year.

Ernakulam has risen on the eastern shore of the blue, broad, deep lagoon separating it from the coastal city, ‘Cochin’, after which the little State was known. The expanse of brackish water is about five miles wide and twelve miles long, penetrating inland through long, narrow troughs, one such touching my village, too. Cochin was a port of call, since the days of Vasco da Gama for merchantmen trading in pepper and spices, like cardamom, cinnamon, and ginger. Paddle boats worked by steam plied back and forth, carrying passengers across the backwaters. There were also native boats and dug-outs in plenty, gliding silently from one, palm-thick shore to the other.

Father loved the tang of unalloyed sea breeze. Though his daily bread and butter had to be earned on the eastern shore, along the verandas of the High Court of Justice, father preferred to live on the western shore, nearer the sea. On holidays and during the court vacations, he did not paddle across. He took delight in playing with the waves and watching the varying moods of sky and sea. He used to appropriate a quiet spot for us both and permit me to play with shells and sand and watch the crabs scurrying home.

Our house in Cochin had a huge crowd of tall coconut palms, shading it from sun and moon. We had as our nearest neighbour a temple, with a replica of the Linga, reputed as having been installed by Rama on the shore of the eastern sea, preliminary to His bridging it for reaching Lanka at the head of His primate hordes. The place on the Eastern Sea, where Rama installed Shiva or Eshwara, is named Rameshwaram; the temple near us on the western sea, which father loved, is also named Rameshwaram.

Father’s name, Narayana, denotes the second of the Trinity or Trimurty…Vishnu. But, that was an inherited appellation. It was the third, Shiva, the Destroyer of the Wicked and the Worn-out, the infinite that finishes all finites, that monopolised his adoration. Burdened with the name of Vishnu, he prostrated before the form of Shiva. In fact, Rama, Himself the manifestation of the Vishnu aspect of the Omniwill, is said, in the Ramayana, to have installed Shiva as a propitiatory gesture, in order to wean Him away from Ravana, Shiva’s close devotee.

Every day in the morning hours, father walked round the inner courtyard of the temple, reciting aloud adulatory verses to Shiva, with me trailing by his side, holding tight the forefinger of his right hand. He repeated this circumambulation on most evenings, too. During the morning schedule, he let me run home at the end of the third, the fifth, the seventh, or the ninth round. Himself, he stood on the stone pavement, facing the east and offered his prostrations to the Sun-God, each full length performance involving a series of jerky foldings and unfoldings, raisings, lowerings, and hits. Father had blotches, hard and dark, on his forehead, chest, elbows, and knees—praiseworthy insignia of his unremitting devotion to the solar ritual.

The temple gave me unforgettable hours of elation. There was a tank as part of the temple complex. It was carpeted green with lotus leaves and a big bevy of buds and blooms. The priest gathered the blooms every day, for the worship of Shiva. He moved on the water from one flower to another, seated in a circular, copper vessel used for cooking mounds of rice on festival days. I watched his voyage, standing disconsolate on the stone steps leading down into the water. The priest noted my plight and sympathised. So, I won a few rides on that metal coracle; I rode on the green carpet, thrilled at the flushed faces popping out of the water to have a look at me. When I saw the man, seated next to me, pull a face from its slender neck and choke it in his clasp, I gave him a dig of disapproval. Yet, the chance to share the round tank-trip, given to me by that servant of Shiva, was always an eerie experience, which I liked.

After a few months, my parents took me to the Shiva temple at Vycome, which later leaped into international fame as the target of a Satyagraha campaign led by Gandhiji himself, for permitting Harijans to walk along a road that faces the Shrine! Father walked the distance, about 20 miles, in stages, with me often sitting astride his neck and mother jogging behind. It was to fulfil a vow, to offer me, the first, male child, as a bond-slave to the Deity installed and invoked in that holy shrine. They spread a long, wide, banana leaf right in front of the open door of the shrine and laid me naked on it. Father and mother fell full length on the floor, by my side and quietly left to walk slowly round the shrine thrice, praying all that while. I was asked to lie still. When they were half-way through the third round, the chief priest of the temple approached them and conveyed a message from Shiva Himself, I have a child on My hands. Take it and foster it for Me with care and devotion. Mother and father had shining faces, when they ran to where I lay. They lifted me gently and forced me to prostrate before Shiva. This has long been the hereditary vow. Years later, when my son was five, we took him to the same shrine to offer him to the Lord and receive him back in trust as Shiva’s bond-slave, whom we had to foster for His glory.

I was, I guess, six years old, when father and mother conspired to impress on me why I must go to school, as my playmates did. They told me I was already late by twelve months. Those children had begun handling slates and pencils, long ago. I resigned myself to the inevitable, as I had when I was weaned. The teacher himself took me with him to the school and brought me home after the classes were over. So, the boys were green with envy, for I was deemed taller than the rest.

However, I had to discontinue my studies before a week elapsed. One evening, father missed his temple visit. Next morning, his dip in the tank was dropped. He lay most of the day in bed. I noticed that mother was squatting in the kitchen, glum and gloomy. I had to climb on her back and breathe into her ear to force a smile. Then, she gently pushed me aside and heaved a sigh. She moved towards the cot, on which father was lying. She did not go too near, nor did father call me to sit by his side, though he turned to me with eyes open. I heard her telling the wife of the temple priest, sadly but severely, "Do not come to this house, for a few days. Amma (Mother) has scattered pearls on Kasturi’s father." After I was born, father was mentioned by my mother only in that roundabout style.

My curiosity was whetted by the reference to pearls. Mother had pearls on both sides of the gold disc she wore round her neck, strung on gold thread. But, why did somebody throw pearls on father? What has that to do with his listlessness? Who was this Amma giving precious things with one hand and illness with the other? Why can’t I see the pearls on father’s body?

I managed to take one, short, prohibited peep at father, who was groaning with pain. I found on his face, chest, and arms yellowish globules sticking to the skin. Pearls? Mother caught me in the act. Seating me on her lap, she broke into sobs. "Mariamma, the Goddess has thrown those pearls, she said, It means small pox." The only drug that could cure small-pox was prayer; the only attention the patient could expect was isolation. Kith and kin, neighbours and friends fled from the person chosen by Mariamma, afraid of their becoming targets of her attention. That was the prevailing belief in Kerala, then.

Mother wanted me to go across the lagoon to her brother, the amanuensis. Father had taken me, often, over to the Ernakulam shore in the paddle boat. The monster wheels, churning furious foam, the engine, formidable and fuming, the screaming siren fascinated me, even while frightening me. She said, You ask for the lawyer’s bungalow, at the High Court Veranda. Then, ask someone at the Lawyer’s where your uncle lives. It is quite simple. I shall send Keshav with you. Keshav was a dear little chum of mine, the son of the temple priest, with whom I had often shared bananas at the inner shrine. Mother gave me a letter to deliver to uncle, written on a piece of wet paper.

I felt very important. I reached the place with no help from Keshav, all on my own. Uncle was plunged in panic. He came over by the very next ferry boat, with us. He wanted to hire a country boat, a hollowed-out log with pointed end, able to accommodate about four people excluding the crew—helmsman and oarsman. He took long to secure one, because few would agree to take in a pox-infected patient. The boat would be contaminated; people would be too scared to travel in it, later. Moreover, the crew had to be men, who had survived Mariamma’s shower of grace. Once one had come through the ordeal of Pearls, one would not, it was believed, be harmed again. Uncle bore the trial grimly. Like mother, he, too, had escaped the Amma.

It was already dark, three full hours after the sun went down into the Arabian Sea, when the boat, with father on his cot and mother crouching by his side, touched the eastern shore. The second canoe, with uncle on the prow and me on his knee, caught up within seconds. The cot was lifted, I could see, with nervous care and deposited tenderly on level ground. I could catch father’s groan and mother’s sob. I could feel uncle’s hand shiver, as I held his fingers while approaching the cot. It was a gaunt and greasy night that closed on us.

Uncle had hired some men to be ready at the jetty or landing platform. I understood that father was to be taken away to where grandfather and grannie were. I heard the word ‘Tripunittura’ being bandied about. The cot was lifted on to the shoulders of four, hefty giants, led by a servant of the lawyer. They hobbled into the night pretty fast and mother—dear mother, my own, my only mother—hastened behind. I was held tight by uncle. He pinned me to the spot. I could not even cry. It was all so sudden, so dark. When I burst into sobs and screamed my heart out, she was too far away to hearken and respond. The stars blinked at my agony. The wind was still. The night softened a little to reveal the brick wall of the High Court of Justice.

Uncle’s children (there were three of them) teased me, whenever they found a chance. They challenged me to recite from A to Z. I knew only six. I had to leave school, when I could decipher F. So, I could not repeat that length of letters. I could only recite in Malayalam its 52 letters! I could not race as fast as they with the lump in my throat and the emptiness in my heart. I sat moodily on the side of the road, which runs from north to south, outside that house. I watched the bullocks puffing breath, while dragging heavy carts along. I asked them in Malayalam (for the cart man did the same) to tell mother at Tripunittura, to rescue me soon from those three, blighted fellows.

The message reached Grannie and mother sent a man to take me to them. The gang of three protested; their days would be dry and drab without me, they cried. But, uncle insisted that I must leave without waiting a single moment. I left just as I was dressed, only in a narrow strip of pink, tucked between the legs. I trotted and galloped behind the long-legged man, who had come to fetch me. He never slowed his pace for my poor sake. I trod the seven cruel miles that separated me from father and mother, picturing in my mind how father rode that day on the shoulders of giants and mother jogged not far behind. The man told me I had to reach the house of another brother of mother, for she was waiting for me there. I wondered why she had gone away from the house, where grandfather and grannie lived.

Mother rushed towards me and clasped me tight to her bosom, weeping and wailing as never before. Where is father? Where are the pearls? I asked. I should not have! She squealed and screamed in agony. The servant, who brought me from Ernakulam, cried, "Amma! Don’t cry. Your son is hungry and tired. I held her hand and wiped her tears and patted her neck, pleading as softly as she used to plead, Don’t weep." At last, someone pulled me away from her lap into the inner room. But, I refused to eat or drink, unless mother fed me. I ran to her; I fondled her chin; I tickled her wet nose; I giggled to make her do likewise. I was unaware that she was hit by a thunderbolt.

It seems father did not rise from the fatal cot. Grandfather had attended on him unto the last, but death had no mercy and father breathed his last. Mother was only twenty two, but fate had marked her out for widowhood.

The twentieth century and Women’s Lib were only just peering from the tomb of the nineteenth. Grandfather was the manager of the temple, where the family deity of the Rulers of the State was installed. He had to respect the folkways and textual prescriptions that control the destinies of the living and the unborn, the dead and the survivors; or else, he would be branded a heretic and outcaste. Mother knew the consequence of nonconformity. So, on the eleventh day after the end of father, the long, thick, black, glossy, soft tresses on her head, with which I loved to play, which I often combed and plaited in fun, were shaved off her scalp by a horrid, heartless barber. She bore the torture bravely, without ill-feeling against the ancient lawgivers. She cursed herself and no other. Poor dear! Poor dear! I threw a rock at the demon, who was carrying off the locks so dear to me; it missed.

Death from small-pox was interpreted as a dire, divine punishment for the victim. The person was damned even after death; the body was denied the privilege of being offered to Fire; it had to be consigned to worms. The funeral rites had also to be performed at some specially sacred place, so that the soul could liberate itself from the penumbra of the curse and trail on, unhampered, to the destination it had carved for itself, through life after life. Poverty forced grandfather and uncles to postpone the purificatory, penitential rites for father. Twenty three years later, I was able to accomplish the duty. I went to Rameshwaram, where the parent temple of the one at Cochin, which father adored daily, was situated. It is on the shore of the Eastern Sea. When we invoked it through Vedic formulae, father’s soul must have come there to be speeded on its way. I performed the rituals in the company of mother and my equal half (the wife) and gave in charity to the priests, grain, gold, and a cow.

2. Grandfather’s Darling

Grandfather had to face two more calamities, very soon. A mean fellow, who was trained in the local School for Scandal, flung a falsehood at his reputation and the mud stuck. He had to give up the managership of the temple and lose the daily share of the offerings to the idol. Our intake of calories was heavily reduced by that unkind cut.

The second tragedy was the arrival, one hot afternoon, of three more stomachs, which clamoured for their share of the depleted stock of food. Mother and I had barely secured our positions at the feeding line, when mother’s older sister sought refuge in her parental home, with her daughter (12) and son (7). She was deserted by her husband at Nagapatam, leaving her to fend for herself and to reach her parental home howsoever she could!

Normally short-tempered, grandfather plumped on the floor with his head on his palms and the palms on his knees. He became taut, touchy, irascible, and even rabid, when grannie tried to mollify him and advised him to face the crisis boldly. I and my two cousins were nuisances, when we moved about the hurdles when others moved.

We were unwelcome burdens. Whenever grandfather cast his look at his two daughters and their piteous progeny, bewilderment darkened his