First Encounters in Rishikesh
Today I’ll talk about the time I spent obsessing about Nisargadatta, and many of you in the group have read him pretty intensely. There are others who have read some of his works, and some of them have been introduced to his works by coming to these talks and Satsangs.
My introduction to Nisargadatta was when I was in Rishikesh. I was going through a bookstore where I saw his book I Am That, and I read a few snippets and found it very fascinating. I bought the book, and I remember I started reading it. I went to the banks of the Ganga and started reading it. I remember I was so engrossed and intrigued by his words that I kept reading, and slowly it became evening and I was still reading. I left the banks of the Ganga only when it became so dark that I was unable to read a single word. Though I couldn’t understand what he was trying to point at, I found each and every word very fascinating and very provocative.
Confronting Concepts of God
I had been on the path for some years, but when I read his ideas, his talks, or his answers on God, it was pretty confrontational for me because he dismissed God. In traditional spirituality, God comes first and then you come later—you are a product of God or from God. But Nisargadatta turned that relationship completely around. He said first the “I am” has to appear; without you, there is no God. Who will attest or prove that there is a God if you’re not there?
Of course, for some years I did wrestle with these concepts. Come to think of it, everything is a concept. Even my thought that there is a God or a thought that there is no God is ultimately a concept. What Nisargadatta was great at—not even just good, he was great at it—was demolishing concepts. He was great at dismantling things brick by brick by brick.
Deepening Connection and Ashram Work in Mumbai
So for a few years, I read I Am That and some of his other works. Then, when I went to Mumbai—as you know, I was in Bollywood for some years doing music—that’s when I got the opportunity to meet some of his direct disciples. He had been in Mumbai, and during that time, around 2003 or 2004, my fascination for him grew. I Am That started gripping me, and that’s when my obsession and my love for him grew boundlessly.
I started meeting a lot of his direct disciples. Most of them were pretty old by that time; if they had come to him at a younger age, they were in their 50s, but most were in their 60s, 70s, or 80s. I did a lot of work for the ashram. They had an ashram there, and because I was into music and sound, I set up the audio systems and took on the entire work of digitizing his tapes.
Digitizing the Tapes with Vaneja
When I was meeting disciples, I met Vaneja. All the talks of Nisargadatta that you hear anywhere on the net were mostly recorded by Vaneja. Aunty Manpreet has also met her a couple of times—a very beautiful, loving lady. She’s very old now and lives in Chennai. She used to go every day and record, and over a period of years, as I remember, she recorded 200 to 300 tapes of his conversations.
One day she asked me, “Would you help me digitize these?” I had a look at the tapes, which were getting old. I had previously helped another teacher at Shivananda Ashram in Rishikesh archive and digitize their tapes, so I had a fair bit of an idea of how to do digitization and noise reduction. Vaneja asked if I could help because we had to preserve his words; magnetic tapes spoil with time.
We started the digitization work over the years and digitized all of his works, so at least the legacy is preserved. Then my friend and I started interviewing all these older devotees because we realized they were getting very old, and with time, their stories would be lost forever. We collected a lot of interviews and stories that we wanted to publish in book form, which hasn’t happened yet.
The Unexplained Headache on Guru Purnima
During this time, when I was deeply into Nisargadatta, something really amazing happened. I remember the date very clearly: July 11th, 2006. I was in Mumbai, and that was the day of Guru Purnima, when you go to your teacher and honor them. I really wanted to go to the Nisargadatta Ashram that day. Generally, I worked during the day, so I thought I would go in the evening when the function was scheduled.
I think it was around 6:30 or 7:00—I forget the exact time, but around then—when I thought, “I have to go now.” Suddenly, out of the blue, for no rhyme or reason, I developed a severe, awful headache. It was so severe that I had to sit down and lie down. Although I really wanted to go, I could not take a single step. I took some painkillers and struggled with the pain, and after three or four hours, the pain went away and I was okay.
I had a bit of dinner and switched on the TV. On the news was the report of the famous bomb attacks on Mumbai trains. That night, July 11th, 2006, several bombs were planted on the Mumbai rail network, and one of the bombs was on the exact train I was planning to take. I was staying in Goregaon, and from there I would travel to the ashram. One of those targeted trains was the one I would have taken at the exact time I was planning to go for Guru Purnima.
When I saw the news, I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was a huge terror attack where so many people lost their lives, and I was supposed to be on that train. Earlier, I had been cursing that weird headache when it came on because I was upset; I wanted to be there with all the familiar faces and devotees I had spent time with, talking, eating, and doing Satsang. But when I saw the news, I just sat down with my head in my hands. It felt like a miracle because if I had been on that train, I would most likely be dead. That incident clearly stands out to me as an instance where Maharaj’s intervention, divine intervention, or universal intervention saved my life. After that, my obsession with him kept growing for the next few years.
Reading I Am That and The Ultimate Medicine
I read I Am That obsessively hundreds of times. There was a time when I knew each and every question and answer; if you asked me a question, I could give you the answer verbatim. Even now I remember about 30 or 40 percent of the text, though I’ve forgotten parts over the years. At one point, I knew the entire book by heart.
Then I moved toward his later works. His later works were pretty terse, and they had a different quality compared to I Am That. A book I read a lot was called The Ultimate Medicine. When I was at home in my hometown, I would get up in the morning, shower, read that book at the breakfast table, work, read it during lunch, work again, and then keep reading it during dinner. My nephew was young at the time—around 7 or 8 years old—and I read that book back-to-back for a couple of months. He used to ask me, “Uncle, how many times are you going to read this book? I always see you reading this book and no other book. Why can’t you understand this book? Why are you reading it again and again? Why can’t you complete it?” He was asking out of innocent curiosity, but that demonstrates the grip Maharaj’s words had on me.
After reading, I would constantly contemplate what he was trying to point at. What is he trying to say when he says everything is an illusion, or “I” is an illusion, or when he talks about “I am” and “the witness”? So many words, angles, and thoughts—what does it all mean, and who am I in all of this? During this time, I collected many of his books, pictures, and recorded talks. I truly loved him and felt that if I had been born 20 years earlier, I might have had the opportunity to sit with him and just be in his presence.
Understanding Maharaj’s Uncompromising Teaching
The best part was that this relationship wasn’t one where he demanded anything, because he was gone. There was no question of him asking for anything. Reading his words, I knew that neither he nor any other teacher could give me enlightenment, so I wasn’t praying to him or asking for his grace. I simply loved him as a person.
He was very direct, terse, and sometimes angry and provocative in his teaching style. From the stories I’ve heard from his disciples, there is a side of Nisargadatta that most people don’t know because they only know I Am That and aren’t familiar with his day-to-day activities behind the scenes. Maharaj used to say to visitors: “If you truly understood what I am saying, you would never come back. Why would you come back? You are here to understand the truth, and once you understand it, my job is over. Once my job is over, there is no need for you to come back.”
In my mind, I used to challenge that thought. I felt I would always return because knowing reality is only one part of it; if you love your teacher, awakening doesn’t mean you drop that love. That love and respect remain. Hearing about his everyday life showed me he was a very ordinary person, completely uninterested in money or fame.
Insights from His Interpreter, Mullarpattan
I met Mullarpattan, who was his primary interpreter. Maharaj spoke Marathi, and when many Westerners started coming to him, two interpreters helped translate Marathi into English. I met both of them. Mullarpattan was the main interpreter; Manpreet and I visited his house years ago, a few years before he passed away.
Mullarpattan shared that during the last days of Maharaj’s life, when he was very sick with cancer, he kept repeating: “Forget me, forget my teachings, but don’t forget ‘I am’.” By “I am,” he meant the sense of knowingness, this consciousness. He emphasized this repeatedly in his final days, pointing out that he wanted seekers and spiritual aspirants to know the truth rather than focus on his persona or teachings.
This is why there are very few books detailing his private life. Unlike Ramana Maharshi—about whom David Godman, Arthur Osborne, and others wrote extensively—or J. Krishnamurti—with books by Mary Lutyens, the Sunanda sisters, and others documenting their daily lives—there was almost nothing published about Nisargadatta’s personal life because he actively discouraged it. He would say, “What will happen if you know my story? It will not help you find reality. What will help you find reality is unraveling the mystery of this consciousness.” Despite that, my friend Kaja and I were stubborn; we interviewed his disciples to collect and preserve stories of his everyday life.
Rare Personal Stories of Maharaj
Today, I thought I’d share one or two stories you wouldn’t have heard anywhere else because we collected them directly. I need to catch up with my friend to see if we can publish them; he has been trying to write and rewrite these stories for the last 15 years and still hasn’t finished.
Here is one story told by Mullarpattan, the translator:
“I was once admitted to the hospital for a minor operation. My room was on the fourth floor. Maharaj came to see me with three other people at about noon when the elevators were closed. Maharaj climbed all four floors. I was really touched by this gesture, especially since Maharaj was quite old at the time.”
Here is another story, also from Mullarpattan:
“After the question-and-answer session, Maharaj and I would go out for a walk and drink lassi. Maharaj loved lassi. Even after awakening, personal preferences don’t just fall away, and that’s fine. Whenever they had lassi, someone among the followers would pay. But if several Westerners or Indians followed us on the walk, Maharaj would whisper, ‘Today we will drink tea,’ because it was cheaper to foot the bill.”
It’s a small detail, but it offers a window into how he thought. Another thing that seemed contradictory to the typical image of a teacher was how he reacted to gifts. Whenever people brought him flower garlands or bouquets, he would usually ask, “How much did you buy this garland for?” If they replied, “We got it for $20,” he would say, “That’s too expensive! These go for $5. You should have haggled. Why don’t you haggled? Don’t you have any value for money?”
This is the same person who writes in I Am That about non-attachment and how everything is an illusion, yet in his daily life, he lived very practically.
The Impact of Dismantling Concepts
Even with Ramana Maharshi, he was very adamant when cooking in the kitchen; he would get up at 2:00 AM to cook and insisted that food could never be wasted. He was very particular about certain things, and so was Maharaj in his own way.
Obsessing about Nisargadatta for years gave me a deep gift. After understanding what he was pointing at, it became exceedingly difficult for me to read any other teacher except Ramana Maharshi or J. Krishnamurti. It was like drinking the finest, most premium tea or coffee in the world—once you develop that taste, you can’t go back to ordinary tea or coffee. Once I understood his words, it also became much easier to understand Ramana or J. Krishnamurti. Earlier, I used to struggle with what Krishnamurti was pointing at, but reading Nisargadatta clarified and illuminated the teachings of other teachers.
The biggest gift he gave me—and gives to other spiritual seekers—is breaking down concepts and completely removing the conceptual framework. Anything you think about enlightenment is a concept; whatever you think about reality or the mind is a concept and not the truth. That dismantling was crucial for me and is crucial for all seekers, because we come to the path carrying so much accumulated knowledge from different traditions and teachers. If you are brought up in a religion, you have traditional conditioning—like I had—about God and the relationship between God and a devotee. Then this teacher comes along and destroys everything. When those structures are destroyed, a vacuum remains for a while because those conditionings were part of our identity. I went through that process where the destruction of these concepts left me somewhat rudderless at sea for some time, something many of you have experienced or will experience in life.