Every Swami devotee has unique experiences with Swami. As Swami says it is a heart to heart relationship. In my case Swami entered my life not suddenly but gradually and then I realised that Swami was God the all-powerful, but more importantly my best friend and a divine doctor. I will narrate these experiences now. 

I had completed my nursing course and was working at a hospital in Bangalore. During that time Swami happened to visit the hospital. The word spread around and all the people in the hospital were excited. I knew about Sri Sathya Sai Baba,  but had no real affinity towards Him at that point of time, nor did I know at that time that He was God incarnate. 

All the nurses and doctors in the hospital stood on both sides of the corridor and were taking Padanamaskaram. This was totally new to me. So I stood in a corner and had Darshan of Swami from there. Swami came close to where I was standing and then suddenly turned and looked straight into my eyes for several seconds. All the people around also turned to look at me as they wished to find out at whom Swami was looking. After a few seconds Swami resumed granting Padanamaskaram. I felt jittery as to why of all people Swami looked at me directly. The Darshan ended and sometime later a colleague of mine came to me and said that Swami had some plan for me and therefore He must have looked directly at me.

I did not make much of what she said at that time, but now after some 30 years I realise that it was true. How my life unfolded and how Swami guided me to His hospital and then took care of me and my family is a story of His Grace. 

Dr. Jagadish Chandran who served as the Joint Director of the SSSIHMS, Prasanthigram for almost two decades was working as medical superintendent in the same hospital as I was working in Bangalore before he joined Swami’s Hospital.

He left the Bangalore hospital and joined Swami's hospital and once when he met me, he said that if I wished to be a part of real seva, then I should  join Swami’s hospital. He narrated how it provided advanced care totally free of charge to all. How doctors and nurses worked with love and compassion and unmatched dedication. I visited the hospital on a few occasions after speaking to the Dr. Jagadish Chandran and realized that there was a great difference between the hospital I was working in and Swami’s hospital.  And decided that I wished to be a part of Swami’s mission. Slowly Swami’s mission was unfolding.

I applied at SSSIHMS, Prasanthigarm and after the interview I got the job. I felt ecstatic when I came to know that all the applicants were cleared by Swami before they could join hospital.

I was totally new to the place, but as I started working at Swami’s hospital, I felt that I always belonged here. I joined Swami’s hospital in 1995 and I continue to work here till date. Now when I look back I feel, that the best decision of my life was to join Swami’s hospital.

Swami takes care of His children in various ways. When we perform Swami’s work, it becomes His responsibility to take care of the trials and tribulations of our lives. To illustrate this fact let me narrate two incidents of my life.

The first incident happened around 2002. My father then was around 56 years old when one day he suddenly had a paralytic attack. His whole body became totally immobile. He was then in Anantapur.  When we got the information we rushed to Anantapur and admitted him in a private hospital. The doctors there suggested that we had to take him to a neurology centre. The only place we knew was Swami’s hospital in Bangalore, the Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Medical Sciences, Whitefield. By the time we reached there it was past mid-night. Looking at my father’s situation the doctors immediately admitted him. Even at that late hour he was served food. After initial assessment by the doctors, we were told that senior consultants would come and visit him in the morning and they would decide the course of treatment. I had never seen my father in such a pitiable state. He could do nothing without somebody helping him. Even small chores like eating and changing clothes were totally beyond him. I was in great anxiety whether he would ever become normal again. I kept praying to Swami the whole night to make my father normal again.

As the dawn broke we were approached by the Sevadal Volunteers in our ward who told us that they were about to do a small Bhajan in the ward, as they would always do before commencing the day’s work, and my father should attend the same. As devoted as my father was to Swami, he painfully motioned me to take him to attend the Bhajan.

It was a herculean task to move him from the bed to the place hardly a few meters away where the Bhajan was to taking place. We put him in a wheelchair with the help of the Sevadal volunteers and made him attend the Bhajan. The sevadal completed the Bhajan and wanted my father to perform the Aarti to Swami. But I told them that he was in no shape to perform the aarti as he could not move his hands at all. Yet they insisted and I made my father hold the aarti plate on one side and holding the other end myself. Then I saw a small movement in my father’s hand and a few seconds later his hand moved a bit more.

He then took his right hand up a bit in a circle to perform the aarti. I let my hand go as I gaped with my eyes wide open, totally stunned. My father’s hand then moved even higher and he then completed a full circle of the aarti without my helping hand. What happened next was even more astounding.

My father who till then could not move his hands or his feet simply got up from the wheelchair and stood erect and performed the complete aarti as all the staff and Sevadal present looked at him with wide mouthed wonder. After completing the aarti he then distributed Vibhuti to all and then bent over and put the plate on the ground.

 Then he just walked back to his bed sat there and started chatting with me sitting on the bed as if nothing had ever happened to him. There was a small crowd, which gathered round him to see this miracle of Swami with their own eyes. I was beside myself with joy and started weeping. Here was my father sitting and chatting who was totally immobile just 20 minutes earlier.

At that time the senior neurologists walked into the ward and were being briefed by the junior doctors, who had seen my father during the night. When they came to my father’s bed he got up and greeted them with a “Sairam”. The doctors looked at each other shocked. Then I told them what had happened during Swami’s aarti. They were all elated to know that Swami’s aarti cured my father from a grave situation. Still they checked my father clinically and performed a CT scan and other tests and told that he did not require any treatment and that my father was perfectly healthy. We happily made our way back to Puttaparthi.

A similar incident happened more recently. It was 2018. My sister was in Bangalore when she had an allergic reaction to something that she had eaten. As there was no time to lose, she was immediately admitted in a private hospital in Bangalore. We all rushed there. Her situation became so bad that she had to be put on a ventilator, and the doctors told us that they could not commit whether she would survive. We had only Swami to depend upon. I rushed back to Puttapathi and went for Swami's Sannidhi Darshan. I put my head on the Samadhi and told Swami, “Swami, I have come to have your Darshan and before I return and see my sister again in Bangalore, she should be out of the ventilator.” It was not a request that I had made to Swami. It was a demand. It came straight from the depths of my heart. It was how we demand from our parents. As I got up from the Samadhi, a Sevadal volunteer handed to me a flower, which had been kept on the Samadhi. I made my way back to Bangalore and when I was just half way there a call came from my nephew that my sister was out of the ventilator and she was breathing easily. Teary eyed I thanked Swami. I had in fact given Swami a bit more time to get my sister out of the ventilator, but here he was answering the prayer much earlier. In a few days my sister recovered completely and she was back home in Puttaparthi.

There are many who feel that as Swami is no longer in physical body how can we feel his love and care? I mentioned the second incident just to put those doubts to rest. Swami has not gone anywhere, He is always there with us, we just need to call out to him with love and He would respond. 

Swami is our father, mother and our best friend and it is a great good fortune that He gave me an opportunity to be a part of his work.

JAI SAI RAM