“Shirdi Sai Baba of the past has become a phenomena of today

[Guest guest]

……“Shirdi Sai Baba of the past has become a phenomena

of today.

 

This can safely be stated on the basis of the

unexpected and amazing number of activities happening

around in India and the world towards the propagation

of the path He had shown. It is seen that in the last

few years the Shirdi Sai Sansthan at Shirdi has

expanded its activities multi-fold. This is somewhat

expected given the fact that an average of about 40 to

50 thousand devotees visit Shirdi everyday. On

important days it is a few lakhs.

 

What is amazing is the construction and opening of

hundreds and hundreds of Shirdi Sai Baba temples and

other related institutions in India and abroad through

the self-motivation of the devotees. Would one

historically examine the way in which temples have

been created by devotees following other paths, it

would become clear that usually the main trust (like

the Shirdi Sai Sansthan at Shirdi) opens its branches

at other places as the first step.

 

Then the main trust and the branches take up temple

construction projects which include planning,

financing, constructing and supervising etc. But in

name of Shri Sainath Maharaj, self-motivated devotees

and groups are themselves creating resources,

constructing temples and carrying out a number of

other religious and charitable activities. No doubt

such self-motivation is a result of the existing

spirit of Shri Sai.

 

Most of Baba’ s devotees are emotively linked with Him

and are prepared to undergo any amount of hardship and

sacrifice to do a task in His name. The rate at which

the number of His devotees and institutions are

multiplying is simply astounding. There are a large

number of publications about Baba in various languages

in the form of books, journals, magazines, booklets

and the number runs to thousands. Devotees are ever

avid to know more and more details about the past of

Baba as also the happenings of today relating to Him.

There are a large number of web-sites on Baba on the

internet.

 

Notwithstanding these multi faced activities, one

important aspect which is necessary to spread the name

of Shri Sai Baba is prominently lacking. That is,

serious research on Baba, using modem research

methodology, is much below the desired standards. Some

scholars from India and abroad, independently or

through research institutions, have made substantial

contribution in research and some books and research

findings in the form of articles have been published.

 

However, a study of these volumes would indicate that

the researchers/authors have not had access to many of

the important documents published during Baba’s time

and thereafter. This is because initially most of the

books and articles written on Baba were in Marathi

language and later English versions or original

writings in English came to the market. There is

hardly any library that has a comprehensive collection

of literature on Baba.

 

To undertake serious research, a good library

maintaining the required documents like books,

journals, newspaper items, manuscripts, hand-written

notings, photo¬graphs, paintings, sketches, maps,

research papers and a well maintained bibliography is

a must. Unfortunately no such library is in existence,

to enable the researches on Baba to undertake serious

study. Some devotees, particularly the writers, are in

possession of some of the important documents but what

is needed is to create a single forum/ body that

possesses and maintains this for posterity.

 

It should be the endeavor of each devotee to collect

all such records of the past and maintain them

properly for use by future researchers. That would be

a great contribution for Baba's cause. Let us resolve

to work towards this end in the New Year to come.”…….

 

 

 

 

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