Contact with The Mother

THE SECRET CARE-TAKER

The year was 1952 when, in the Kumbh Mela at Allahabad, there was a bridge-crash.

Myself, my mother and two other Gurubhais were on a pilgrimage. We reached the Kumbh Mela a day before the actual date. We were put up in the Bharat Sevak Samaj buildings. We came out of the building and went to the bathing ghat of the Yamuna. My mother took a dip in the holy waters. My friend suggested to me that we should leave my mother at the Samaj building so that we could be free to move about and see the mela.

While on our way to the Samaj building, we saw a big party of sadhus coming in a procession. As the procession was nearing us, two of our men stood aside while we—myself and my mother—were surrounded by spectators and they came in such a rush that many people fell down layer upon layer. We too fell on a group of persons and another group of persons fell upon us. “I am undone,” came my mother’s cry. We could not get up and were trod upon by other persons. My mother felt helpless. But she started calling to the Divine Mother. For two or three minutes we were under the pile of people. But I pulled myself out and turned towards my mother, lifted her out and took her to one side.

As I was in an old military khaki dress, the people thought me to be a military man. Coming out of the human débris, I asked the crowd to sit down. They all sat down. In the meantime the military police came. They also gave the same order and asked all to sit down. My mother could not move because of severe pain. But she went on calling to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.

We somehow took her to the camp in a rickshaw. No doctor was available at that time. We did hot-water fomentation and sent a telegram to the Mother informing her of the condition of my mother. She was very weak. But I felt that if the night passed without any serious trouble, she would survive, because by the next morning the Mother at Pondicherry would have got the telegram and as a result her Grace was sure to act. As soon as we sent the telegram, we happened to meet a homeopath doctor. He gave some medicine. The night passed without trouble.

The next day we left for our home town and from there wrote a detailed letter to the Mother. We got her blessing-flowers and my mother was completely cured soon without the use of much medicine and thus, despite her old age, survived the stampede of a crowd.