World of Philosophy

SR No.: 007005
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Christopher Key Chapple, Intaj Malek, Dilip Charan, Sunanda Shastri, Prashant Dave
Publisher: Shanti Prakashan
Publication Year: 2011
Total Pages: 1002
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 30 MB

Page 573

Ahmedabad, and two research students were studying for the Ph.D. degree of the Gujarat University, Ahmedabad. At that time I was also giving my honorary services as a Regional Office Secretary of the Vishva Hindu Parishad, at Ahmedabad. One day, there came to see me in my office in the Gujarat College, Ahmedabad, a Swaminarayan Satsangi named Janakbhai Dave, to request me to teach Sanskrit to the Swaminarayan Sadhus at the Shahibag Swaminarayan temple in Ahmedabad. I accepted the offer, and started going to the temple and teach the Sadhus for about a month. On reaching the temple, I used to take bath change clothes, done the white dress of a Swaminarayan Parshad consisting of a Dhoti as the lower garment and another Dhoti as the upper one.
In 1983,1 retired voluntarily, on completion of twenty-five years of the Government service and joined as the Director of the Maharshi Veda Vijnan Academy, Ahmedabad, run by a Trust headed by Shri Ishwarbhai Patel, the Ex. Vice Chancellor of the Gujarat University, Ahmedabad. I served there for about a decade, say up to 1993. Thereafter, I was living the life of a retired Government pensioner, occasionally teaching Sanskrit to the Jain Sadhus, and doing job-works of translating Gujarati lectures of the respected famous Jain Acharya Vijay Ramchandrasuriji Mharak Saheb.
To my surprise, one day, in the year 1997, there came to see me a B.A.P.S. saint with some other person to inform me that I have been appointed as the Director, of the Akshardham Centre of Applied Research in Social Harmony (AARSH), in the Akshardham at Gandhinagar, managed by the Bochasanvasi Akshar-Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (B.A.P.S.) headed by Highly Respected Shri Pramukhswami Maharaj. At that time I was not a follower of the Swaminarayan sect. I was informed that I would have to go there once in a week, and guide the Swaminarayan saints studying for the research degree of Vidyāvāridhi (equivalent to Ph.D), and that the arrangements shall be made for my going to, and returning from, the B.A.P.S. destination at Gandhinagar. And, finally, in year 2001, I was blessed by the highly respectable Shri Pramukh Swami Maharaj with an initiation (technically known as Vartmāna) making me a Satsamgi by favoring me with a wonderful Kanthi with his own holy lotus-hands, and grant me entrance into the lucky Satsamgi Samāja, the very doorway of the Akshardham, the divine abode of the Supreme Bhagavan Swaminarayan. Jay Swaminarayan!
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