Recently i came to my hometown to my parents, to stay here for a while. Last evening, we went to a temple in a nearby village. “There is some Yagya and a Bhandara happening”, my dad said. Dad said that there came a Baba there for a 11 day retreat. He asked me to come with him. We went there, i saw so many slippers outside the temple. I was curious to know what’s inside, why there are so many people here.
Among those hundreds of slippers, we placed our pair of slippers near a tree trunk so that we could easily find them back when we return.
Anyway, as we entered the premise of this temple, i noticed it’s a big enough open area around the temple. We started walking around the temple among the crowd that has gathered here to get the blessings. We walked a bit and from a distance i noticed there are people sourrounding someone and few of those guys are blowing air to this person with their makeshift fans they made with some cloth. My curiosity spiked. I am rushing to see this Baba. My dad is saying, “touch his feet, take the blessings”. I am saying in my head, “let me see the person first”
I somehow managed to get to the front of the crowd and i am standing there looking at the Baba. It’s a guy around 30-32 years old sitting there on a chair and there are people sitting on the ground touching his feet. I am standing there wondering, what’s the deal here.
There is a voice coming from my side. It’s my dad asking me to take the blessings.
I moved from there, giving way for other people to take the ‘blessings’. On the back side of Baba, there is a huge Pandal, with a huge flame. People are going around that flame.
I found a old friend from school time. I met him, said hello. And i desperately wanted to ask him, “what’s the deal with this Baba?”. I, instead asked, “Do you come here everyday?”, just to test the water. Yes, he replied.
I didn’t feel like asking my question to a guy who is coming here everyday for eleven days. Mind you, this guy is an MBA. He is from the same town from where i am. He came back home after getting his MBA and is here since then, managing his father’s business.
Anyway, i digress.. this environment where people are so much into all this, coming to this 11-day thing and bowing to this 30 years old guy, who seems stoned to me, is pretty nuts tbh. And my teacher mom and dad are among those people.
I found 2 more people whom i have known from past times. I tried popping the question to them also. Finally i could ask one person there, he said this Baba has been doing ‘Narmada Parikrama‘ and he is on water diet. My next question is “so what!?”.
This has always been crazy to my rational mind. I don’t understand how people get so blind on the name of good. How do they start worshipping some guy?
In my opinion, these are the superstitious people who are either afraid of God, or they believe so much that they start seeing these guys as Messengers of God. This is crazy.
We are living in 2023, human race is trying to make Mars inhabitable, the era of OpenAI and AGI, where we again and again prove that knowledge is the ultimate truth that guides us forward, as an individual and a race altogether. And here i was standing at a place among people with blind faith towards a guy and spending days here worshipping this Baba and praying. What a contrast!