Ramakatha Rasavahini Volume 1: Ramayan in English by Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba

Sri Sathya Sai Media Centre is a Unit of Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust. On 25th May 1947, Sri Sathya Sai Baba in a comprehensive letter to His brother Seshama Raju, outlined His Mission and Purpose of His Advent. A pertinent excerpt reads as follows (free translation from Telugu original).

I have a task: To foster all mankind and ensure for all of them lives full of bliss.

I have a vow: To lead all who stray away from the straight path again into goodness and save them.

I am attached to the work that I love: To remove the sufferings of the poor and grant them what they lack.

I have a reason to be proud, for I rescue all who worship and adore me.

I will not give up my mission, nor my determination.

I know I will carry them out.

The vision declared at a young age of 21 years, began materializing in the year 1956 when Sri Sathya Sai Baba started a general hospital for the villages around Puttaparthi, where poor villagers had no access to pure drinking water or basic medical amenities. It took another decade for a college for Women in the district capital of Anantapur to be built in the year 1968, in recognition of the importance of educating women who are the backbone of nation-building and a college for men in the outskirts of the city of Bangalore in the following year to answer the emergent call for an urgent shift in education paradigm. As Baba's work constantly grew in response to needs of the poor and distraught, the Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust was founded by Him in the year 1972. Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust is a Public Charitable Trust registered under Section 12A of the Income Tax Act, 1961 for carrying out activities in the areas of:

1. Relief to the Poor

2. Medical Relief

3. Education

4. Other objects of General Public Utility

Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba wrote Ramakatha Rasavahini in Telugu and Shree N. Kasturi translated the book into English.

Sri Sathya Sai Baba was born in Puttaparthi on Nov 23, 1926 - an auspicious Monday in the lunar month of Kartika, when Lord Shiva is especially adored. He was given the name Sathyanarayana Raju. What intrigued His mother Easwaramma, most was the unbounded compassion her little Sathya had particularly for the poor and downtrodden. Even as a toddler, He insisted that the beggar at the door be served well in spite of their own limited means and would often give His own share to the needy. When He began school, His playmates were inspired by His ability to lead them to be socially responsible, spiritually aware, endowed with individual and national character. His friends were often fascinated by His extraordinary powers of creating things out of thin air, knowing the future, deep understanding of scriptural wisdom and so on.

The inexplicability of His actions greatly disturbed His father Sri Ratnakaram Pedda Venkama Raju, and on May 23, 1940, he angrily accosted Sathya to reveal His true identity. Sathya just took a few flowers and flung them down which arranged themselves to read “I am Sai Baba.” Later that year, on the morning of Oct 20, halfway through the school day, Baba suddenly returned home, cast aside His books and dramatically declared, “I am no longer your Sathya... I am Sai. I have my work, I cannot wait any longer.” Thus, that day forward Sathyanarayana Raju became Sathya Sai Baba.

From that epochal moment on, kings to commoners started thronging to His presence seeking solace and succour as Baba cancelled an incurable disease of one, sorted out familial problems of another, and likewise. His growing fame, accompanied by rising ridicule from envious quarters, rattled His elder brother Seshama Raju, who wrote a letter cautioning Him of His activities. In His reply, dated May 25, 1947, Baba emphatically stated that He has a 'Task' to 'foster all mankind with bliss', a 'Vow' to 'lead all onto the path of righteousness', and a 'Work' of 'removing the suffering of the distressed', also assuring that He would never give up on those who attach themselves to Him.

Towards this end, in the 1960s Baba germinated the Sri Sathya Sai Seva Organisations in India, through which people across religions, class and caste, could collectively engage in selfless service and foster the eternal values of Truth, Righteousness, Peace, Love and Non-violence, for their own spiritual uplift. In no time the movement grew global to more than 126 countries with Prasanthi Nilayam being its epicentre.

While millions of inspired individuals took to practising selfless love, to create working models for them to emulate, Baba founded the Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust in 1972. Since then this umbrella institution is engaged in the implementation of trailblazing projects like free primary to tertiary-care hospitals, free education from primary schooling to doctoral research, free drinking water to remote villages, free housing rehabilitation initiatives, etc., demonstrating to the world new paradigms to raise society's quality of life inspired by love, service and universal brotherhood. Baba, Himself exemplified this higher life incessantly for 86 years where the power of pure love was in glorious action.

On His 83rd and 85th Birthdays in Nov 2008 and 2010, on His devotees' request, Baba rode on a golden chariot. Only later did everyone realise, those were indeed symbolic of the golden culminating moments of Baba's earthly sojourn. Baba discarded His bodily vesture on April 24, 2011. The devotees miss His physical form, nevertheless, they continue to experience His guidance and grace, as enigmatically as ever. The Universal Consciousness that is Sri Sathya Sai eternally lives on.

Sai Ram from Prasanthi Nilayam