SMARANANANDA, BLISS OF MEMORY

SMARANANANDA, BLISS OF MEMORY

It was 1984. On the way back from Belur Math one evening I entered the Saradapeeth Meditation Hall and took my seat midway through a discourse of a middle-aged monk squatted on the floor in front of Sri Sri Ma Sarada Devi's installed photograph. The monk, I now gather, was then 54. But what he said caught my immediate attention and has remained etched in my nemory ever since, at first in a curiously incongruous way but later distilled in the clarity of consciousness. The monk was the Secretary of Saradapeeth, Swami Smaranananda, much thinner then and far less imposing than his later colossal figure post spiritual advancement to the highest realms of realisation. The words came through thus: "আপনারা যাঁকে ঠাকুর বলেন, ওই আত্মাই হচ্ছে ঠাকুর |" ["Who you all call Thakur, that Atman is Thakur."] This was simply incomprehensible at first how the peerless Paramahamsa despite his exalted status as Avatar, one who had a form and had attributes, could be the formless, attributeless Atman. Clarity came later after years, delusion dispelled. But the impact of those few words spoken with unmistakable clarity of vision was tremendous and it proved the power of the personality that uttered them.

Years later. 2007. Swamiji's birth anniversary celebration at his Ancestral House. Swami Smaranananda at 78 was now General Secretary of the Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission. After Swami Jitatmananda, Secretary of Swamiji's Ancestral House, had delivered his inspiring address in which he went gaga over the settlement in Seattle and the contributions of meritorious Indian students to high-tech US industries, Swami Smaranananda rose to the podium. His manner of speech was so unlike his flamboyant younger brother monk. He said, "আমরা এতক্ষণ শুনলাম, মহারাজ বললেন, কেমন করে আমাদের দেশের সব ভাল ভাল ছেলেরা এমেরিকায় গিয়ে বড় বড় বিশ্ববিদ্যালয়ে পড়াশোনা শেষ করে ওদেশেই থেকে যাচ্ছে আর বড় বড় কোম্পানিতে কাজ করছে, অর্থ উপার্জন করছে, মানযশপ্রতিষ্ঠা পাচ্ছে | খুব ভাল কথা | কিন্তু আমার মনে হয় তারা যদি বিদেশে গিয়ে বিদ্যার্জন করার পর দেশে ফিরে আসে ও গ্রামে গ্রামে ছড়িয়ে পড়ে গরিব গ্রামবাসীর জীবনোন্নয়ন করে, তো আরো ভাল হয় |" ["We have just heard what Maharaj said how our meritorious students have been going to top American universities for higher studies and how after completion of study they are settling in that country and getting employed in top American business houses where they are earning money, name, fame and position. It is all well and good. But I feel if these students after acquiring higher education abroad return to their motherland and spread out in the villages in the service of the poor villagers, it will be even better."] The audience was surely taken aback by the frankness of his statement and moved by the simplicity of this sannyasi whose intense feeling for the suffering rural people impelled him to utter these soulful words. The direction of the mission of the Ramakrishna Order was once again set right by a seminal soul.

A couple of years later. 2009. My mother and I used to visit Belur Math on Sunday late afternoons. After the routine temple visits at the Math, we used to pay a visit to Swami Tattwasthananda (Bibhuti Maharaj) at Arogya Bhavan. One evening we had just prostrated before Sarada Ma's giant photograph at the ground floor of Arogya Bhavan when in came Swami Smaranananda (General Secretary, RKMM) with a couple of monks on some business. He seemed simply out of proportion, a giant of a man, a titanic soul, and we fell at his feet in reverence. It was some sort of a revelation, I should say, which reminds me now of 1987 when Swami Lokeshwarananda at Belur Math on Sri Ramakrishna's Tithipuja Day was flooded by a surging crowd of devotees after Swami Atmasthananda (then Assistant Secretary of RKMM) had suddenly darted ahead and fallen at his feet. That day it seemed that Lokeshwaranandaji was a divine being quite apart from ordinary mortals in terms of sheer size of spiritual personality. Smarananandaji evoked in 2009 at Arogya Bhavan a similar response. Only he seemed more removed from earthly aught, yet absolutely focussed on the executive work at hand, all power, yet all grace, as he received our prostration dispassionately and with no airs.

These are sporadic occasions, stray memories of Maharaj which remain like fresh flowers laid at the hallowed feet of his person only. 

'Smaranananda'---the bliss of memory. For him it was the bliss of memory of his beloved Lord Sri Ramakrishna but for us it is the bliss of memory of Maharaj himself, a simple man in a complex world, a natural in an artificial setting and a youth whose first love remained his last---Ramakrishna. 

Written by Sugata Bose