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D. Swami : Sayānapūram Doraiswami Iyer (1882-1976) was born at Kālahasti, the fourth child of Vidyanātha Iyer who was in the administrative service of the Raja of Kālahasti (now Chittoor, Andhra Pradesh). When pregnant with him, his mother had prayed daily at the Kālahasti temple, & been granted three boons to her forthcoming child: a long life, an illustrious career & a pious life. Once, after her pradakshīṇa of the temple she fainted & on coming round found the prasādam of coconut, betel leaves & fruit placed near her, symbolising the Lord’s assurance. Around 1884, after her husband’s death she left Sayānapūram & came away with her children to her father’s house in Madras. The children grew up under the benign influence of their maternal grandfather, the great Veena Kuppu Aiyer & his son Thiruvottriyur Thyāga Aiyer, both deeply religious personalities & masters of Carnatic music in the tradition of Samba¬moorthy Sastri. Kuppaiyar’s guru Saint Thyāgaraj of Thiruvaiyaru once visited here & sang his famous kriti “Sri Venuganalola ne” in raga Kedāragowla. Twice a year Kuppaiyar held ten-day music festivals where famous artistes including his disciples Coimbatore Thai & Veena Dhanam performed & the whole neighbourhood attended. The family worshipped regularly at the Thiruvottriyur Amman temple & later became devoted to Ramana Maharshi. In 1904, when still a student at Law College, he became a disciple of Kāvyakantha Ganapati Muni (Nāyanā to his disciples) who named him Sudhanwan (q.v.). Nāyanā fired him & his friends with his discourses on the greatness & depth of our Vedic heritage & the need to revive it in order to regain the vitality & courage of true manhood. By then Subramania Bhārathi had moved into a house in the same street. He composed many of his songs in D’s house & their friendship lasted until Bhārati’s death. It was the time when revolutionary activities of Punjab & Bengal had reached the ears of D & his friends. Inspired by the revolutionary movements in Punjab & Bengal, especially Sri Aurobindo’s Bande Mataram, they sought Nāyāna’s the guidance & formed a small revolutionary band including Chidambaram Pillai, Chakkarai Chettiar, Jayarama Naidu, Raghunatha Rao & several teachers, lawyers & writers, they formed the first group of nationalist Tamils of 40 spread over Madras, Chittoor & Vellore. D & the Mandāyam brothers, Thirumalāchāri & Srinivasachari, contributed generously to help Pillai start his Swadeshi Steam Navigation Co. They also helped Thirumalāchāri launch his weekly India in 1906, in which Bharati published most of his powerful writings & forbade them from taking up any violent activities. He gave them the mantra Umām Vandemātaram, as a source of their power, & the next year wrote Umā Sahasram embodying the quintessence of all Her aspects & invoking Her grace for the freedom of the Motherland. He left them in Nov.1907. [Nāyanā, by G. Krishna, Kāvyakantha Vasishtha Ganapatimuni Trust, Madras, 1978, based on the Telugu original by Gunturu Laskmikantan of Yellamanchili, published from Secundrabad in 1978] D & some of his group attended the Surat Congress where they witnessed Sri Aurobindo’s role in that historic Congress [see V.V. Sastrulu’s account in entry Tilak]. In August 1908, Bhārathiyār & his friends moved to Pondicherry. “After Bharati escaped to Pondicherry,” writes D’s grand-nephew, “information regarding the freedom struggle used to be sent to Appā [D] through paper slips that were dropped as though they were alms into the hands of couriers who were in the guise of beggars seated outside the Thiruvottriyur temple…. This stealth became necessary because his house was under police surveillance – a constable in mufti was always sitting on the thinnai.” [“A Mission to Tiruvottriyur” by Cmdr. R. Ganapati (Retd.), in Madras Musings, March 16-31, 2009] In 1911, D was called by an important client in Cuddalore. He brought that brief to Sri Aurobindo who pointed out the detail on which he could build his case. D won the case & a fortune as his fee which he offered to Sri Aurobindo but the latter refused. Back home, as per his promise to his dying mother, he got married 12-year old Meenakshi of Madurai. It was also natural that Kapāli Shāstri, a relative of D & also a devotee of Bhagawan Ramana Maharshi & Nāyanā, would turn to Sri Aurobindo & first visit him 1917 & later settled in the Ashram. After taking his law degree D had taken up work with S. Srinivasa Iyengar (later Advocate-General), & later under Sir P.S. Sivaswami Iyer. Although, he began practice (around 1916-17) with only Rs.15-30 a month, his “inborn gifts” (Sri Aurobindo’s phrase), his many-sidedness, uprightness, straightforwardness, nobility of character, helped him build an exceedingly lucrative legal practice & his high ethical & professional standards won the esteem of judges & colleagues alike. “He was never known to mislead the judge or overstate his client’s case or understate that of his opponent,” writes his junior Rāma Iyengar. “So much so, it became a regular practice for the presiding judge to ask the court stenographer to take down his opening address, & to reproduce it later verbatim, in the initial paragraphs of the judgement. He had, on one occasion, accepted a brief on the original side for a defendant on a fee of Rs. 6,000 expecting the case to last for three days. Justice Reilly, the presiding judge, agreed with him on a preliminary point & dismissed the suit in limine, & the trial was over before lunch-break on the first day itself. D asked his secretary to immediately write out a cheque for Rs. 4,000 & hand it over to the client, who, having won the case, was exceedingly reluctant to receive it; but his protestations were of no avail…. And this was no stray incident.” No wonder then that in later years, when he attended a proceeding, he was not expected to stand up with the others when the judge entered, or that he refused the post of a judgeship. To Nirodbaran’s question Isn’t it be¬cause of his change of consciousness resulting in a change of values of life that he could discard all fame, post of honour, etc.? Sri Aurobindo replied: “I don’t think so. He never wanted to be a judge etc., he was never an office hunter.’’ [Correspondence with Sri Aurobindo] In 1921, when his circle of patriots decided to join Gandhi’s non-cooperation movement, Sri Aurobindo assured him that “Mother India does not need either his [Sri Aurobindo’s] own or D’s services – she was destined to achieve freedom any way & very soon.” He was highly respected for the silent substantial help he always rendered to the needy & deserving that came his way. In the early 1920s, D was forced to buy Palm Grove, a large estate in Royāpettah High Road (near Kapālishwar temple), from an advocate friend whose practice was on the wane. At that time there were more than twenty juniors working under D (among the ones who did not linger long was R. Venkatarāman who turned politician & became President of India). In 1923, Sri Aurobindo asked him to arrange for an urgent operation at Palm Grove itself for a sadhak accompanied by Champaklal, Purani & Rājangam. The operation was performed by Dr. Rangāchāri, the highest paid surgeon in town. That same year, Sri Aurobindo asked him to convey a private message to C.R. Das who was then in Madras after visiting Sri Aurobindo. “An interesting incident happened yesterday,” wrote Punamchand to Dikshit on 14 July 1927. “Babuji (Sri Aravinda) signed on the deed for the house he has purchased in the presence of local French citizens as per French laws. Among the citizens were Philippe [Pavitra], M. Potel, David (barrister), D (at Babuji’s invitation), & the house owner. When everything was arranged in one of the rooms on the first floor of his house, the above named people went upstairs. Chairs were already placed there. First, Mātushri came & saw if all had come. Then she went inside. Next, they both came out, Sri Aravinda in front & Mātushri behind him. D made sāshtāṇga-dandavata pranam. Sri Aravinda’s seat was, as always, immediately beside the door. Everyone folded their hands. He himself was very serious. Taking the deed from the owner, D gave to him; he read the whole of it. Meanwhile, D took the pen from the table, opened it & put it in Mātushri’s hand. She was standing beside Babuji’s chair. Then he said, “Where have I to sign?” D pointed out the place. After signing, he immediately got up, bowed with folded hands to all &, without saying or doing anything, went inside.... D was saying that his body appeared very tender & much fairer than before. This was the first time he came out after November [24, 1926].... Write the above account to Chandulal at Bombay, to identify the room, write that this was the room where Mātushri & Sri Aravinda sit for meditation.” [Raman Reddy, “Sri Aurobindo Ashram – The Story of the Main Building”, 2008] In 1928, the Mother admitted Meenakshi & D’s younger sister to the Ashram. Such was the Mother’s trust in D’s judgment that while no one was allowed to visit the Ashram without her permission, he could bring along with him those he felt were worthy of coming. Among those seekers he helped to turn to Sri Aurobindo & the Mother, was his client Rama Reddy of Nellore, whom Sri Aurobindo was to rename Satyakarma & whom, later on, the Mother made one of the first Trus¬tees of the Ashram. But before Appā actually left Madras, the Grace offered him an opportunity to set in motion a long overdue change in the Government’s attitude towards Sri Aurobindo & his devotees. Since the time Sri Aurobindo arrived in Pondicherry, the British police helped by the French, kept a watch over everyone who visited him. Here is an account by one visitor: “When I left Pondicherry to Madras [in 1923] a secret policeman was dogging my footsteps & pointing me out to his relieving brother policeman at the railway junction, & this continued till I reached Gooty, my destination, which is next to Guntakkal…. After I reached the place, the local inspector of police came to enquire with my father-in-law as to when I would leave the place & about my future plans etc…. I somehow pacified my wife & started to go after a couple of days’ stay. But, I was threatened with serious consequences if I went, by official & non-official friends of my father-in-law, who was an influential & leading lawyer in the place…. The police, as usual dogged my steps till I reached the Master.” [At the Feet of the Master, T. Kodanda Rama Rao] Then, in 1937, the first Congress ministry was ushered in Madras, with Rajagopalachari as the Premier. He offered Appā the post of Advocate-General. While declining the offer, Appā requested a cessation of this sort of police harassment which had been going on for over three decades; & perhaps pointed to the unproductive expense of money & manpower. Rājāji pulled the necessary strings & the result is reflected in this remark in the diary of Yogananda, a disciple of Sri Aurobindo: “I began my journey to Pondicherry, arriving on 11 August 1932. In those days, the main gate of the Ashram remained always closed. Outside the Ashram, British spies kept constant vigil. Only in 1937 did this spying stop, due to the intercession with the Government by one of Sri Aurobindo’s disciples, Doraiswami.” [“Their Presence: Vast & Unfathomable”, Mother India, Jan”09, p.61] Early in August 1938, D presented a copy of Umā Sahasram to Sri Aurobindo. Later Mother told him, “If Ganapati Sastri is inclined to come for the August 15th Darshan he is welcome.” Accordingly, he brought Nāyanā on the 14th. He stayed with D in his room in Meditation House for about three weeks. On 16th, when he met Mother for 30 minutes, he felt spiritual currents passing into him from all sides, while Mother later told D, “He is the one man who immediately entered into my spiritual Consciousness & stuck to it to the end.” The next meeting, on 19th, lasted 45 minutes. While he recited hymns on the Mother & talked of her present Avatāra, she went into trance: he saw a bright light emerging from her toe, then a halo around her entire being, the whole atmosphere was surcharged with divine currents. The last meeting, on 25th, lasted 70 minutes. [“My diary-leaves”, K.S. Venkatarāman, Breath of Grace, 1971, pp.362-3] Later Mother told D that when she meditated with Nāyanā she felt a flow of new powers into her, & that his presence had the power to drive away Asuric forces, a phenomenon she witnessed during the evening soup ceremonies [“Ganapati Muni & the Mother”, Madhav P. Pandit, Mother India, February 1965, pp.14-15] “The day after Cripps’ broadcast, there was a discussion in Pavitra’s room, & the Mother happening to come that side, joined…and spoke her mind…. ‘…behind this offer there is the Divine Grace directly present…. But if it is rejected the Grace will withdraw & then the nation will suffer terribly, calamity will overtake it.’ The Mother then referred to France rejecting the Grace in 1940 when Churchill, after the evacuation from Dunkirk, offered a ‘union’ & joint nationality with Britain to fight Hitler….” [On the Mother, by K.R.S. Iyengar, SAICE, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 3rd Ed. 1994, pp.425-26] ― Soon afterwards, Sri Aurobindo deputed Appā to carry his message to Dr. B.S. Moonje of Hindu Mahāsabhā, & Rajagopalachari, a friend of Appā & a senior Congress leader, in connection with the Cripps Proposals [see Autobiographical Notes…, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2006, p.469-71] “It was the evening hour,” writes Nirodbaran, “Sri Aurobindo was sitting on the edge of his bed just before his daily walking exercise. All of us [attendants] were present; Duraiswamy…was to start for Delhi that very night. He came for Sri Aurobindo’s blessings, lay prostrate before him, got up & stood looking at the Master with folded hands & then departed…. Duraiswami went with the soul of India in his ‘frail’ hands & brought it back, downhearted, rewarded with ungracious remarks for the gratuitous advice…. When the rejection was announced, Sri Aurobindo said in a quiet tone, ‘I knew it would fail.’ We at once pounced on him & asked him, ‘Why did you then send Duraiswamy at all?’ ‘For a bit of nishkāma karma,’ was his calm reply, without any bitterness or resentment.” [Twelve Years with Sri Aurobindo, 1st Ed. 1972, 3rd Revised & Enlarged Ed.1988, pp.148-50] In August 1942, Rajagopalachari opposed the Quit India program, & in October 1943, he wrote in the Amrita Bazaar Patrika, pleading for reconsideration & revival of Cripps’ Proposals, giving the same reasons as Sri Aurobindo had conveyed to him through D. [Evening Talks with Sri Aurobindo, A.B. Purani, 2007, p.769-70; s/a “A Sage’s Emissary”, K. Vedamurthy, Madras Musings, March 16-31, 2009; “Gandhi & Rājāji” by R. Guhā, The Hindu, Feb. 2, 2003.] Appā had always believed he would die after the age of 60, so Mother admitted him to the Ashram in 1938 & gave him & his family the small house in the same building as the Embroidery Dept. He passed away there on 2nd December 1979. Sri Auro¬bindo had promised to come to him at the time of death, so, after having bid his adieu to all present, he gestured to them to keep silent & passed the last hours in deep meditation & peace.