Some incidents reflecting the Saadhakatv (seekerhood) of child seekers.
While doing Dharma Prasaar Seva, whichever district I lived in, mainly children and youth would enthusiastically become my associates in Gurukaarya (mission of my Guru). Today, I would like to share some interesting anecdotes pertaining to their seekerhood with you. In 1999, during my trip to various par
ts of Dhanbad district, news items would appear in newspapers regarding my Pravachans (discourses) continuously for a few days, now call this God’s grace or something else, I never had any interest in such kind of a fame, just as Arjuna could not see anything except the eye of the bird, similarly after being connected to my Shree Guru doing and getting Sadhana done has been my main objective. The summer vacations were on, I set out with my Vanar Sena (the battalion of child seekers) for propagation of Gurupournima. When in the midst of propagation, I went to a house, the head of the family recognised me and started saying, “You are Tanuja Thakur, I keep reading about you in the newspaper, come inside, I want to talk to you.” When we went inside his house, he served Sharbat (sweetened water) to me and my Toli (brigade of 10 children) and started asking me questions regarding spirituality. His words reeked of malice, ego and attitude of insult. I was a bit surprised as to why he was talking to me in such a manner after respectfully inviting me into the house. I thought it appropriate not to answer his questions. For the attainment of my objective, I have always been avoiding expending my energy and rather than telling about Sadhana to egoist persons, I find it more proper to maintain silence. In the course of our conversation, the gentleman revealed that he was connected to 40 spiritual organisations and has taken gurumantra from ten Gurus. Whichever question he asked, I simply replied, “You tell me, I would like to know from you” After listening to him for 10 minutes, we sought his permission and set out for Dharma Prasaar to another house. A second house was situated at some distance, a Class IX student too was with me and clarification of doubts by me, attracted him a lot. He told me, “Didi you knew the answers to all the questions that he was asking; but you did not answer even a single question. You could have given him a resounding reply to him and shut him up.” He was not being able to digest the insult of “his Didi”. Before I could say anything, a child seeker of Class VI said, “Did you not see, how much ego was spilling from him, Didi had told us that God imparts knowledge only to humble persons.” He went on, “Didi, how stupid is that scholar, to attain God, one organisation and one Guru are enough, he is wandering in 40 organisations!!!” I could not suppress my laughter, but prevented him from saying anything more. I said to myself that this is a case of the disciple surpassing the Guru, it had been only four months since these children had got associated with me and their Sadhana-related chats were such that they could stun much older people.
Let me narrate another incident in context of these children
One day, we were travelling by a four-wheeler vehicle from one part of the city to another and our entire platoon was with us too. One child had devised a very good way of inviting other children to Baal Sanskar Varg (workshop pertaining to values for children). I did not know who had devised the plan. I asked everyone, “Who had chalked out that idea of Prasar? One girl child seeker blurted out, “Didi, I had thought of it.” I was about to say something when another child seeker said, “Now, God cannot get anything else done through you, you have developed an ego!!!” Listening to their conversation, even before saying anything, I started laughing and all of us burst out laughing together. The girl seeker got ashamed and after some time, said, “Didi, God had suggested this plan to me, this is how I should have put it, right ?”
I will cite a third incident, with relation to the same group
Summer vacations were on and a book fair was getting organised in Dhanbad. I asked all the children, “Would anyone of you like to go for this Seva, for I was thinking of putting up an exhibition of the books authored by our Shree Guru during the book fair.” Three seekers of Class XI said that they would do the Seva by taking up all the responsibilities. I felt very happy and explained to them all the aspects of the Seva and as these child seekers had already performed the Seva of distribution of books with us at book exhibitions in few temples; hence, they had experience, more or less, of the same. I had several Seva pertaining to Gurupournima with me. On the first day of the week-long book fair, I could reach the book fair only at 6.00 p.m and saw that our ‘young army’ had been holding the fort with extreme efficiency. So much so, that those manning the nearby stalls started saying, ‘Didi, your children are highly trained and intelligent, even the boys at our stalls cannot look after the stalls so nicely.” Our children would even announce the special features of the book over the microphone from time to time to attrat the crowd in their stall. I got a bit carefree and due to my preoccupation with other Seva, could visit the book fair again only on the fourth day at around 4.00 p.m. On reaching there, I saw that due to scorching heat, none of the book stalls had opened their exhibition rooms and all were sitting inside their stalls, only our exhibition room was not only open in the entire field, but four child seekers were standing in the sun, sweating profusely, with the sun’s rays burning down upon them. Seeing their condition, I became very worried and said, “It is so hot and no one has opened the exhibition room, why have you people opened it? You should have opened it after half an hour, when the heat would be a bit less. The seeker to whom this responsibility had been entrusted very simply said, “They have put up the exhibition to earn money and we have done so to earn Gurukrupa (the grace of a spiritual master) ! Who knows, His Holiness Gurudev might come here in any form and if He finds our stall closed, we will remain deprived of his grace; that is why all of us thought that we will start the Seva on the time that has been decided for the exhibition ” and all the associate Sadhaks agreed with their head. I was so overpowered with affection seeing the innocence and Bhav of those young obedient seekers that I don’t have words to express my feelings. I immediately brought a bedsheet from a seeker nearby, and first of all, arranged for some shade there and also arranged for some favourite eatables of the children, for looking at their Seva Bhav (spiritual emotion for doing service) that was all I could have done at that time! A big book publisher from Delhi, who was right opposite us, “It seems, you have trained these children right from their infancy.” I said, “No brother, it has been only four-five months, since I have been introduced to these children.” He said, “Then, it must be said that the disciple has surpassed the Guru (Master). After some time, I was transferred and those children too went away to bigger cities for studies and I lost contact with them. Today, all these seekers are manning high posts in top companies and when some of these children met me on Facebook after several years, not even one greeted me with a “Hi”. All of them started the conversation by asking me, “Pranaam Didi, how are you?” It is true that none of the children is bad, only we are not able to give them a grounding in our cultural values.
