Champaklal Speaks

Mother’s Solicitude

1944-12-04

Received a letter from my brother Sunderlal that my father had passed away. When I informed Mother about it, she asked: “How did that happen? Prior to this was there any report of his illness?”

C: “Yes, Mother, there was a letter saying my father was on his death-bed and that if I wanted to see him I should go there.”

Mother kept silent, looked down for a long time and then said: “Now your mother is alone there?”

C: “No, Mother, my elder brother is there.”

Mother: “Yes, that I know. She does not want to come here? When she came here she told me that she would like to come and stay here and that she would come with your father for good. If she wants to come, she is welcome here. You will write that from me.”

Even before she had come to Pondicherry in 1933, my mother suffered from rheumatism and had acute pain while walking. But here she walked about everywhere with perfect ease—she could, as we say, even run. The Mother remarked: “She is very open.” Later she asked my mother: “Do you want to stay here? If you want to, I will keep you.” But my mother went back because she felt it was her duty to remain by the side of my father.

Now, after my father passed away, Mother asked me if my mother wanted to come and settle here. When she asked about my mother's daily needs, I said: “She will have no difficulty here except in using a commode.” In the house in which Bansidhar lives (above the present Ashram Post Office) there was on the ground floor an Indian toilet for servants. Mother knew it because she had sanctioned it. Mother told me that she would build another toilet at the back for my mother and the one for servants would be shifted elsewhere,

I wrote to my mother to come to Pondicherry. She made arrangements to come but as her rheumatism became acute she gave up the idea. When Mother was told this, she said: “If, in spite of that attack, your mother had stuck to her determination and sat in the train, her pain would have gone.”

This is why, whenever I have to go out from here I go with full faith in the Mother and she makes everything easy for me.

So much Grace was showered on her by the Mother! And she would have done the same for my father too, if he had wanted to come and stay.

Long before my father passed away I had shown his photograph to the Mother. She had then spoken highly of him and asked Sri Aurobindo: “Is he a Pundit?” And to me she had said: “I have seen him, of course not physically. I know him.” After his passing, when I showed his photograph to Mother, she told me she liked it but asked me not to hang it on the wall. I was told to keep it in a box.