The First Divine Encounter

t was in the year 1935 that once Sardar Gurdial Singh Thapar, a well known Rais of Ludhiana and intimately known to my father, impressed by my father's divine bent of mind mentioned about Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj. He further disclosed that sometimes Babaji pays a visit there and stays at Rambagh, a garden located on Ludhiana-Jagroan road.

My father requested him to take father alongwith him on Babaji's next visit to that place. One day Sardar Gurdial Singh Thapar came to my father and informed him about Babaji's arrival. My respected father immediately took couple of baskets of fruits and proceeded alongwith Sardar Gurdial Singh Thapar to Rambagh for Darshans.

Near a Talai in the Garden, Babaji was in Samadhi and Holy Shabad Kirtan was in progress. A large congregation was rapturously bathing in the overflowing Grace of Babaji's physical presence. The whole atmosphere was surcharged with Divinity.

My esteemed father and S. Gurdial Singh Ji after paying their obeisance sat close to Babaji. After sometime Babaji opened His Holy Eyes and looked around. Seeing my father His Holy Eyes get rivetted on him. Then Babaji asked S. Gurdial Singh about my father, and he accordingly introduced him with reverence and humility.

After that, Babaji took leave of the Sangat in His characteristic humility and proceeded inside the place where arrangements for His stay were made. My father also followed Him alongwith S. Gurdial Singh. Babaji inclined on a cot, and my father and S. Gurdial Singh sat close to the Lotus Feet of Babaji.

Again, Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj focussed His Holy Eyes on my father and conveyed a deep Divine Message which only the recipient could feel and understand. It was recognition and discovery of someone most intimate, nearest and dearest one.

Nectar was flowing from the 'Pools of Nectar' which the Holy Eyes of Babaji were and that Nectar was drenching father's body, mind and soul.

Father, who intimately knew most of the Saints of his time, at once realised that he only belonged to Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj from times immemorial.

Completely dissolved in the Nectar of the Grace of Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj he reached home. Love-smitten father proclaimed to my mother and all of us, with all the joy and cheer at his command that he had discovered and found the God - The Guru Nanak.

I had never seen father so happy before. He kept on telling about his visit and holy darshan of Mahan Babaji, for quite sometime that day. He had totally forgotten and lost himself in the Eternal Glory of Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj.

While doing Holy Kirtan, my younger sister Bibi Bholan Rani, in a state of madness of love, used to invariably sing :

Aseen Babey Labh Laey Jee Sara Jag Dhundh Ke

We have discovered Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj
after scanning the whole world.

This first encounter was a most wonderful spiritual miracle. My father first time met and saw Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj and his whole being was possessed by Him, by His All-Enveloping Splendour, by His All-Penetrating Divinity.

Hunger for God and hunger for worldliness cannot co-exist. A lover of God does not crave for worldly things and pleasures of the senses. He wants the Lord and the Lord alone to the exclusion of everything else. He is totally immersed in all- absorbing love of the beloved Lord.

Divine Love of Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj penetrated deep into the heart, the very soul of father and thereafter he could think of nothing else. He pined day and night to rush to Him and see Him again and again. He intensely felt and experienced within him, a burning love for Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj. It was continuity from births immemorial through Eternity.

Such was the wonderful expressions of love we heard from our respected father after his first meeting with Mahan Baba Nand Singh Ji Maharaj.