Shri Shri Mohanananda Brahmachari, the soul and former Mohanta ( Head) of the Karnibad Monastery at Deoghar that is eponymous with Shri Shri Balananda Brahmachari, his own Guru, passed away at River Park Hospital, McMinnville, TN, USA in the morning of August 29, 1999 He was 96. His last public appearance was on July 28 ( the Guru-Purnima Day), when he personally conducted despite his failing health the ceremony in memory of his dearest Gurudev, Shri Shri Balananda Brahmachari who had predeceased him in the Ashrama already mentioned in 1937. The following day he suffered a relapse from which he never recovered.

He was born in a well-to-do Bengali orthodox pious Hindu Banerji family on December 17, 1903 in Midnapore and was named Manomohan. At age 17, he left his college studies and family to join the Ashrama, founded by Shri Shri Balananda Brahmachari, then one of eastern India's pre-eminent holy men, who embodied so to say Vedic religion in all its sublimity and nuances. Balanandaji was initially hesitant to accept him as one of his disciples. But persuaded by the young Manomohan's sincerity, ardor and devotion, he relented and embraced him as his disciple, whereupon he became Mohanananda Brahmachari. This name, Mohan in short, celebrated his abundant charms- handsome physical presence, exquisitely mild and sweet behavior, as well as ability to sing in an inimitable voice Kirtanas, of which Balanandaji was so very fond .

The next few years he sat at the feet of his Guru, and excelled in serving his Guru and mastering in the process the Vedic religion in all its essence, nuances and exposition. When Balanandaji was on the point of renouncing his mortal body, he chose Shri Mohanananda to head the Monastery he had founded.

Ever since he assumed the role of the Mohanta, his fame reached far and wide until the Ashrama that he now headed attracted pilgrims- disciples, devotees and non-devotees alike- in thousands until Deoghar's Eucalyptus-lined Karnibad Ashram became a must-visit center for everybody who wanted to recharge themselves, spiritually as well as in other respects, after year's excesses particularly during the great Sharadiya (Autumnal) Durga Puja. At those times Deoghar and the surrounding areas would hum like a gigantic beehive. Even the poor and the ordinary- small businessmen, workers, vendors, rickshaw-pullers, would feel the presence of this holy man who also was a sort of universal provider bringing them means of livelihood and unlimited love in no uncertain way.

While Balanandaji had a rather stern visage that effectively hid his soft heart, Shri Shri Mohanananda Brahmachari exuded softness, tenderness if one will, that was a reflection of his all-pervasive compassion for all, including those that did not exactly see kindly to his style of dispensation of religious truths. Besides, he was a charmer without being a panderer. He had infinite number of tools that served him to charm the people who came in contact with him- his wit, his smiles, yes even his silence, his blessings that people, including non-devotees, craved for, and which he gave in abundance unconditionally; his kirtans-bhajans sung with an ardor and inimitable voice that would keep them awake, yet engrossed until the wee hours of the morning. On the top of that, in course of time he came to muster a divine healing power that his devotees came to draw on in times of their physical ailments-many times incurable.

The way he propagated his version of religion was unique; he would give his darshan after his daily worship with homa (sacrificial fire); he would not speak unless he was addressed to give his responses to the questions of his audience. Most of the time he would sing songs, some by Rabindranath and others including his own, that contained the essential tenets of religion, including India's Vedic. If his audience did not catch them, they would still be revived by the sweetness and fervor of his inimitable voice and the ardor with which he sang. His memory was elephantine, and it seemed that songs would pour forth from his lips like the Alakananda from the Gangotri in the Himalayas, and people would feel somewhat purified and definitely refreshed..

Thus charmed people would like to offer pranamis ( donations at his feet) almost totally unsolicited. And in turn he emerged as the ultimate fund-raiser for all worthy causes: education for the masses, succor to the needy, sick, disabled and old. Some seventy-eight institutions-schools, hospitals, charitable dispensaries, dharmashalas-in West Bengal, Bihar, UP, New Delhi- all attest to his unique sense of devotion to the cause of charities that have a very important role in our needy, impoverished country.

Maharajji, or simply 'Baba' that his devotees called him, depended, to a great extent, on the tenets of Shrimad-Bhagavad-Gita. Not a day passed that he did not recite it. And in so doing, he built his own life on its sturdy foundations; he imbibed its truths, even embodied them. He embodied fearlessness, purity of heart, steadfastness in the Yoga of knowledge, charity, self-control, sacrifice, study of the Vedas, austerity, uprightness, non-injury, truthfulness, absence of anger, self-sacrifice, tranquillity, freedom from slander, kindness to beings, non-covetousness, gentleness, modesty, absence of fickleness; boldness, forgiveness, fortitude, purity, absence of hatred, absence of conceit. Thus he was close to divinity indeed

Although he sincerely cherished Chaturvarnya-the caste system as legitimized by the Gita, in practice he subscribed to and practiced the concept of equality. To him, man/ woman was the measure of all and accepted them all as equal. To him woman was surrounded by an aura of sanctity. He traveled to almost all the continents of the world, and all the races appeared to him to be endowed with the same dignity. In this way he practiced equality. He was a unifier in the ultimate sense of the term.

Even when he was that close to divinity, he was very human too. His wit, his frolics, frolicsomeness, his interest in photography, his overweening interest in feeding people through bhandaras, his affection for children-all made him so dear to all the people that came into his contact. No wonder people from almost all walks of life and from all over the world- India, Americas, Europe, Africa, Australia- wanted to have him come to their homes to bless them and ward off evil from their drudgery-prone existence. Indeed, he visited many countries, including the United States, each year since 1973 to bless and to give them a sense of India's eternal religion as also to help them get connected with their fellow compatriots and culture. Through his visitations, they seemed to be rejuvenated at least for the time being.

All these qualities, divine as well as human, made him in their eyes a beloved personality even when he seemed so different. As he loved them, so they loved him. It is exchange of this precious gift of love that bound the Guru and the devotees together in a sacred knot that cannot be sundered. He was their dearest, at once close to divinity as well as humanity. To paraphrase Rabindranath's famous lines: "Whatever could we, the disciples, offer to the Lord, we offer to our beloved. Whatever we offer to our beloved we offer to our Lord. Where shall we find more? We make our God dearest to us even as we make our beloved our God."

With his passing away one of the greatest exponents of our faith and a model of sanctity has disappeared from our midst. Are we going to see his like again?.