Indian Scientist and Sri Sathya Sai Baba Avathar of Miracles Part I

'Miracles are my visiting cards', says Sri Sathya Sai Baba. Many scientists received his visiting cards. Dr Bhagavantham was one such scientist.Dr S Bhagavantham was the Director of All India Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. He also later held the prominent position of Scientific Advisor to the Ministry of Defence in New Delhi.

In 1959, he went for a walk with Sri Sathya Sai Baba on the sands of the Chitravathi river in Puttaparthi. Baba asked him to select a place for sitting down. Bhagavantham selected a place. During the course of the discussion, Bhagavantham told Baba that Oppenheimer, after exploding the atom bomb, quoted the version of Bhagavat Gita to express his reaction.

Immediately Baba asked Bhagavantham, "Would you like to have a copy of Gita". Baba suddenly took a handful of sand and gave it to the learned scientist. When the sand reached to Bhagavantham's hands it was no longer the sand of the holy river, but it was a red-covered book.

It was Gita printed in Telugu language.Dr. Bhagavantham says:."In our laboratories, we scientists may swear by reason, but we know that every time we have added a little to what we know, we have learned of the existence of many other things, the true nature of which we do not know. Thus while adding to knowledge, we add more to our ignorance too. What we know is becoming a smaller and smaller fraction of what we do not know.

How do I reconcile my background of science with what Sathya Sai Baba does? I have seen miracles performed by Baba perhaps in the thousands during the fifteen years that I have known him; materializations of an infinite variety of physical objects, healings of every description. I must confess that with the logic I know and the training I have, I cannot accept Sai Baba is like you and me. He can transcend the laws of physics and chemistry. I have therefore to describe and declare that he is a phenomenon, that he is a transcendental being, that he is divine.

" Dr Bhagavantham personally experienced thousands of miracles of Baba. To list the miracles of Baba is a difficult job.In his thought provoking book, 'Sai Baba ?The holy man and the psychiatrist', Dr Samuel Sandweiss, the famous western psychiatrist, asks: "Who is Sai Baba ? If his powers are genuine, how can he lead one deeper into the innermost mysteries of our existence?" With these basic questions in mind he came to India and started his search.

Has he succeeded in his mission? In his exciting journey what did he find out about Baba. Let us see in the next part.

By: Santhanam Nagarajan