Sometime in the year 1912 AD a pious Bengali couple named Bankim Babu
and his wife Ashadevi, then childless after seventeen years of marriage,
undertook a pilgrimage to the holy shrine of Kedarnath for the
fulfillment of their desire for a child through the grace of Lord Shiv.
Calamity struck the couple halfway down the return trail. Bankim Babu
was seized by a bout of severe intestinal distress and soon collapsed.
As Ashadevi sat there wailing with her husband’s head in her lap, a monk
mysteriously appeared. It is known from the written testimony of the
Gurus of the parampara that this was none other than Bhagwan Lakulish
himself, though of course this couple was not to know this till many
years after.
He appeared in the form of a young man, clothed only
in a loin cloth. He wore wooden sandals on his feet and carried a
kamandal (water pot) in his hand. His hair was matted and his body was
smeared with ash. A rosary of rudraksh beads adorned his neck. He
emanated a subtle brilliance.
Learning from Ashadevi the cause of her distress, he
poured water from his kamandal into the palm of his hand and sprinkled
it on the prone Bankim Babu. Shortly, the latter opened his eyes and,
fully revived and restored, rose to his feet. Promising the couple that
he would some day met them again in Calcutta, the monk departed and soon
disappeared from view. The couple completed their return journey home
without further incident.
Three months later the Mahatma appeared at the door of
Bankim Babu’s home in Calcutta. He stayed only a day. In the course of
the short stay he revealed certain mysteries concerning himself. When,
at his command, given a ceremonial bath by the couple in the evening,
his body dissolved in the bath water only to be found again seated in
meditation in the room provided for him. He laid to rest their anxieties
concerning the birth of a child and promised them such a birth exactly
an year later. He also discussed with them the matter of their spiritual
initiation and gave mantra diksha to both, while however promising
Bankim Babu that he would be initiated into yoga when mantra recitation
had sufficiently purified his body. That same night, while the couple
slept, he departed from the place.
In the months following, Bankim Babu spent all his
time in mantra recitation and also made arrangements for the settlement
of all his worldly affairs and making provision for Ashadevi. One night,
without informing anyone, he left home and never returned. His daughter,
in due course named Kamlesh, was born in his absence and that child and
her mother were to see Bankim Babu again only seventeen years later
under very different circumstances.
1913. After leaving home Bankim Babu took sannyas
diksha from Swami Prakashanandji of the Udasin sampradaya and was given
the name Pranavanand. He spent the year following this event in visiting
all the major pilgrimage places of India. One day at Hardwar he was
sitting on a platform near the Shiv temple on the banks of the Ganges
when Lord Lakulish appeared and revealed that he had come to give him
yoga diksha. He took him inside the temple and gave him initiation there
and instructed him to take up secluded sadhana. The purpose of his visit
being over, he disappeared.
Swami Pranavanand spent the following seventeen years
in secluded sadhana in a hut in a forest near Rishikesh. His ayukarma
coming to an end, he died at midnight on Yogini Ekadashi in the year
1986 of the Vikram Era, corresponding to June 1930. It was later
revealed by Lord Lakulish (Rishikesh, 1949) to a future kulguru, Swami
Kripalvanand, that Swami Pranavanand’s soul entered a new embryo on the
same day that he gave up his body. He also said, “He has not yet taken
to yoga but he will do so at the appropriate moment and will receive
appropriate guidance. I have already arranged for that. He was and will
remain my disciple”.
Swami Pranavanand had attained annashanvritty, a state
where a yogi conquers hunger and thirst and all the vexations of
duality. It was thus a highly purified body that he left behind.
1930. The moment Swami Pranavanand’s soul left his
body, Bhagwan entered it simultaneously, so that there was no lapse of
time between the one event and the other. Bhagwan remained in occupation
of this body for a period of twenty months for fulfilling the purpose of
his Divine play.
After assuming the form of Swami Pranavanand, Bhagwan
retreated to the solitude of the interior Himalayas and there passed
twelve days in uninterrupted sadhana to purge the body of any remaining
impurity. From there he went to Hardwar and thence to Bombay. There he
took under his wing a young boy from Gujarat named Saraswatichandra whom
the Lord had chosen as the third kulguru in his parampara and through
whom the purpose of his lila would be carried one step further.
The purpose was complex, profound and multi-faceted.
It included the worldwide propagation of the moral and ethical values
and principles of sanatan dharma and the ancient science and knowledge
and practice of yoga. The Lord had appeared to lay the foundations for
that purpose and to create the conditions for the perfection of Swami
Pranavanand’s yoga in his succeeding life so that this century would see
a perfected yogi in his parampara and Swami Pranavanand’s destiny would
be fulfilled.
Bhagwan was to later reveal (Rishikesh, 1949) to the
next kulguru in the parampara: “I have a great resolve that cannot be
realized in just a few years. The lineage of my disciples, beginning
with Pranavanand, will have to advance this mission little by little
over a period of many years. In this lineage certain selected souls will
take birth turn by turn and enhance the mission further. They will be
required to develop high spiritual powers in order to carry out this
mission. In this manner not only will the mission be fulfilled, but
those disciples will accomplish their own spiritual development as
well”. Bhagwan revealed that four such souls have been chosen. It could
not have been otherwise, for in each one of all his incarnations, there
have been only four specially chosen ones.
1931. This task was now advanced a step further when
Bhagwan came from Rishikesh via Hardwar to Bombay to there find and
initiate the third kulguru of his parampara. On the day of this event,
he found in a temple in Bombay a confused and disillusioned young boy
from Gujarat named Saraswatichandra whom he would now by his grace
elevate to the status of the greatest Yogacharya of his time and the
next kulguru of the lineage. (For more, read
Swami
Kripalvanand).
