Telegram dated 10 April 1966

= TAKE TREATMENT AND REMEMBER ME = = MEHERBABA = =

Amiya's reminiscences about the telegram are given below. However, to understand them requires some context, which will be supplied by quoting directly from Memoirs of a Zetetic (with only light editing):

___________________begin Memoirs of Zetetic excerpt

It was in the early month of 1960. One day, a strange sensation overcame me as if somebody was very powerfully holding the nape of my neck. I tried to get quits with the sensation by moving my head in all the directions north, east, west and south but it did not at all help. The grip remained as tight as ever, and within a couple of hours I had no alternative except to go to a doctor and ask him to find out what was wrong with my neck. The doctor, in the normal course, diagnosed my case in the category of a stiff neck, sprain etc, and accordingly dished out a handful of pills and capsules for me to swallow and analgesic massages to be done. But no medicine could combat the strange hold on my neck. It grew from bad to worse and I was just scampering from one doctor to another in hope of relief. The night hours were the worst. I could not lay myself down on the bed. Pillows to the tune of three or four had to be kept under my head to give a shadow of relief. But the disease s eemed to make a ghastly grin at all these attempts that had persisted for days and then for months on end. Imagine dear reader, someone or something holding your neck from behind with a strong pressure for months. I literally cried out at times, to the sorrow of my family members and consternation of my friends.

Surprisingly, just when I was suffering like that, RKU (Rajani Kant Upadyaya) went to a doctor for some treatment. The doctor gave him some injections and big allergic patches all over his back, thighs and neck were all that he got from the treatment. Although the doctor swore that the injection could not have produced that kind of reaction, yet RKU drew little comfort from such medical assurances. Worst came to worst, he felt like scratching the patches violently and he did it with his fingernails and with chips of wood or a pencil when the remoter parts of the back appeared inaccessible to his fingers. Soon the patches turned into wet, itching sores and RKU began to go from doctor to doctor in search of a cure. I do not at all undermine the skill of doctors in my town here. They are good ones, and many of them have degrees from foreign countries too. But both in RKU's and my case, all their medical wisdom seemed to fail without any apparent reason. When the best medicines had been tried and no results obtained, both victims had only one alternative left and that was to approach Meher Baba and see if He could cure us.

The darshan of Meher Baba ultimately was declared open during the summer months at Poona and we both decided to reveal our troubles to Baba and ask Him to do something about it. But before we had boarded the train for Poona, we had already about five months of the most miserable kind of experience in our lives. Now we could bear it no longer, and we wholeheartedly looked forward to relief if Meher Baba could effect it. During that trip, my mother also accompanied me and a simple-hearted poor youth was also with us. He was a rich lawyer's servant, and was named Maruti.

As usual, thousands gathered for darshan at Guruprasad Hall, Poona, but when we entered the portico, some volunteers came forward and told us that Baba had strictly enjoined His devotees not to ask for anything during the darshan period. They even ensured from the devotees that they were going to respect Baba's wish and not ask for anything. Now that was what you might call the drowning of a boat just within inches of the shore! We looked like paintings of dire misery! One with his neck tightly screwed up from behind and the other who had done hardly anything but scratch his body for months and months! But I was really desperate by then. As I was entering the hall I asked to my mother, in the name of love, to tell Baba about my suffering. She agreed, as most mothers would do and that was my chance.

When we were admitted to Baba's august presence, He seemed busy for a while with somebody. Then He looked at us. Well, that was the moment. Mother without any hitch told Baba that I was suffering for the last five months from a strange neck pain that no doctor had been able to cure. Baba looked at me with a questioning glance. I looked back with all the self-pity I could summon and said: "Yes, Baba I am really miserable. Please cure me!"

The moment I uttered those words, Baba's face clouded and became stern. "Why did you ask for anything? Did you not know that I have forbidden all my lovers to ask for anything?" I broke into tears at this admonition. Suffering as I was, I had no other alternative except to ask Him to help me, and it was so much like a pent-up swimmer clinging to a life buoy. Between sobs I conveyed to Him that I felt that even a healthy dog was more fortunate than I was and I had undergone untold agony for so many months.

Baba's face softened and He told all devotees to go out of the hall and signaled me and my small group including RKU to remain inside. When the hall was vacated, He said, "I shall pulverize your body, Amiya!" That brought fresh tears in my eyes. Then He asked Eruch to get a bottle of medicine from another room. As Eruch brought a small bottle containing ten tablets, Baba touched the bottle with His hand and gave it to me. "Now take that. Every night take one tablet with a cup of milk. But remember one thing for sure. Before you swallow the tablet, you must take My name 100 times. Will you remember that?" I nodded my head but Baba looked doubtfully at me. He turned His gaze at RKU. "Are you staying with Amiya?" "Yes, Baba." "Well, I entrust you with the responsibility of seeing that he takes my name 100 times before swallowing one tablet every night. Will you do that?" "Of course, Baba, I shall see to it." "Well now, Amiya, do not worry any more. You shall be well if you follow my instructions."

How grateful I felt at that moment and also how bold. Little did I care for breaking Baba's instructions about not asking for anything. I looked at Him and said, "Baba, poor RKU is also suffering from an incurable itch all over his body." Baba looked stern again. "Why do you tell Me all this? RKU, go to a doctor. There are many good doctors in Poona. Get yourself checked up by any one of them." RKU kept quiet I felt sorry for him. Baba had relegated him to a doctor again and there was no courage left in me to ask Him to do something for him after the serious manner in which He had given this advice.

[the book now gives the account of how Amiya found that he was cured in the morning.]

When I looked at RKU, he sort of scowled. Evidently he could not help it, nor could I have, had I been in his position. I told him to go to one doctor for a checkup as Baba had bid him do. "No," he roared, "I won't go to any doctor. Baba has cured you, and Baba has to cure me, too!" As RKU was physically stronger than I was, I thought it was better not to argue the point with him, knowing and almost feeling his irritation and frustration ...

_______________End excerpt from Memoirs of a Zetetic (for Rajani Kant's cure, see Memoirs)

Here are Amiya's further reminiscences, triggered from looking at the telegram:

This is when I had that nasty feeling I had that somebody was holding me by the neck -- 6 months torture. All of a sudden, I couldn't have done it, it happened when Baba wanted it to be. Just one pill and it was all over, and I had taken injections in Jabalpur. I had all the treatment, father was a doctor, friends to help me out, highly qualified doctors. I went for allopathy, I went for ayurveda, I went for homeopathy, and then he asks Eruch to get a bottle of pills, just puts His hand on it, and He says take one a day for such and such a period of time, and take My name 100 times before you take it in the night, and the very first pill solved it.

Again He was up to His games. "All your disease is imaginary." I told him I felt less fortunate than a healthy dog on the street. Baba said, "Is he not handsome, is he not looking well?" All the Yes Men said, "Yes he's healthy and he looks fine. "Such an entertaining point. I wondered why Baba asked me. He knows I'm not fine, I know I'm not fine. Then he gives me the pill. Goher rebukes me for it, because when I went out I asked her what was in the pill. I was already well read in medicines, I knew medical science. I just asked. She said, "What do you mean? Is that medicine? It is Baba's prasad! He just gives anything and that becomes prasad. It's no longer medicine." My God, she got mad. She said, "You only do what He tells you to do and forget about medicine."

And it was enough. Much more surprising was Rajani Kant Upadhyaya's cure. "Strip off your banyan [shirt]"; He said, and the sores were all gone. Rajani Kant wept like a child. And nobody knew. Baba didn't give anyone the chance to see it -- a cure like Jesus' cures.

Things have happened, you know, and now to have an iota of doubt would be absolutely sacrilegious. He is the Highest, and the only one perhaps.

Amiya continued to reminisce:

The story of "take My name 100 times before taking the pill":

Baba asked Rajani Kant whether he could help me remember to take the pill along with His name. "Yes, Baba! I'll do it," he replied. Rajani Kant is very present-minded, and I am inferior to him, I'm absent minded, so I needed help. Fine. First night, I open the bottle, I take the pill in my hand, and say, "Baba, Baba, Baba, counting. And after 100 times I take the pill, take the milk and gulp it down. I developed a slight fever some hours after that. In the morning, I go to brush my teeth, and suddenly shout out, "Where is the pain gone?" Rajani Kant comes running -- his troubles are still with him, and he looks at me with jealous eyes and says, "What's it Hazra?" I say "Pain is gone."

The next evening, just as in Freudian psychology, it just happens that you forget something when you don't need it, like forgetting an umbrella when it doesn't rain. I take the cup of milk, and take the second pill out of the bottle, and Rajani Kant also forgets that he has to remind me. (Laughs). He starts telling some tales from the Mahabharat, and Maruti and I and everyone else is so wrapped up in listening to the story from the Mahabharat that we do not remember to take Baba's name. I absentmindedly take the pill. As I try to gulp it down, it gets stuck in the throat. Now I shout out, as I realize that I have forgotten to take His name, and He and I and Maruti are all saying, "Baba, Baba, Baba ..." like that. The whole atmosphere is different. We are all in panic.

The next day when we come for Baba's darshan all the time during the trip to Guruprasad bungalow, which is 6 kilometers away, we are all praying to Baba, "Baba, please do not ask us. We have made a mistake," and he does not ask us.

That night, I took the pill and took His name.

The day after that as we were going to Guruprasad, we forgot to pray that He should not ask us [about two days ago], and He asks us. See, the first time He fulfilled our prayer, but the next day we forgot to pray again, and He asked us. "Did he take My name?" I said, "No Baba." [tone of voice very downcast] "Rajani Kant, did you not remind him?" "No, Baba, I forgot." [tone of voice equally embarrassed and humiliated] That's how it is (laughs).

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