Sri Sri Sri Tadepalli Raghavanarayana Shastry Garu-part-3

Last posting we saw how Chandavolu shastry garu went to Pushpagiripeetham and his vidya-leelas.

This posting I will concentrate on certain interesting aspects of his life.

Shastry Garu, thus toured the country and Andhra and did many such intellectual feats and finally he came home.But the financial situation in home was not good.Their family used to take one meal per day to save money.Apart from that they had a Rs.10,000 debt(which was quite a huge sum those days) and also pecuniary troubles with the pathashala.

Once the situation took a worse turn insomuchas not having food for three days in a row! Then, Shastry Garu started to do Lalitha Sahasranama Archana on the third day night in a temple nearby to the tune of 27 times! He did not have any naivedya to give Ammavaru, so He gave just water as naivedya and sipped that alone as mahaprasada and slept there itself after neatly spreading his Angavastra on the temple slab.

He had a miraculous dream in which he saw a ten year old girl who came to him and playfully said " Hey! I will give you what you are begging. Just open your angavastram a bit wide. Hehe!(she giggled)".

The playful girl poured a fistful of rice grains in it and said, "A vehicle will come, board it and go".

Miraculously in the morning itself Kazeepalem Seethaaramaraju Garu's(local king) vehicle came and picked Shastry Garu for Purana-katha- kalakshepa in Raju Garu's house.When he came home really tired after the Katha-kalakshepam back home, he saw that Raju Garu had given rice grains in a rice bag to his house, which arrived before him.

From that day on, Chandavolu Shastry Garu did not have any want.

Chandavolu Shastry garu then did in kazeepalem (7 months),Pittavaripa lem,Gokarajupale m,Rachapalem, Kolluru,Nagaram, Pooshadavaari palem, Alakapuri--- Devi Bhagavatha Parayanam,Harivamsh am,His father's Ramakathamrutham, His own Datta-bhagavatham, etc for many many days.

He used to finish the parayanam in one day and then come home that night itself and do japa and pranayama the whole night and then start again to do parayanam next day! This was his daily routine day in and day out with no physical discomfiture or complaining of any lack of sleep.

He like his father had great Nishtha,determinato n and a strange kind of adamance which defined his divine life.

One incident of his childhood reflects the later quality mentioned above.

As a small kid, once he was eating groundnuts in his aunt's(mennattha) house. His aunt spoke harshly about his avaricousness to eat groundnuts.From that day onwards, he not only did not touch groundnuts but also did not use even groundnut oil even for cooking in his house.

He also because of his niyamas did not eat some vegetables and herbs like

Tindora(Dondakkayi)
Ramamulaka
Potatoes
Radish
Cabbage
Garlic
Onions.

Also, once while he was travelling in a train. Some arrogant youngsters who were smoking cigarrettes, did not allow him to sit next to the window(which was his rightful reserved seat). From then he did not go on trains except once for Kasi prayanam.(The whole journey being spent by standing near the door and sleeping next to it instead of in his seat!)

In the dharma-paripalana he did not resort to Aapadharma,Pakshaan taram,Vikalpam, Arthawada and thus sway from the established Dharma-peetham.

(To be continued... )