Foreword by the author - Chinta Murali Kishan Rao
By virtue of our ancestors’ good deeds and our last lives’ fortune, we had the divine darshan of Sri Poornananda Swamy in Pochampaadu’s Project (Sriram Project) Colony at Sri Radha Krishna (BRK) garu’s house. My wife, Rangadevi and my sister, Balatripura Sundari wanted to have the darshan of nine Vinayakas on the occasion of Vinayaka Chavithi. As they were going around the Project Colony for Vinayaka’s darshan, they also visited BRK garu’s house. After having the darshan of Ganapathi, they sang ‘Vandanam Vandanam’ song in BRK garu’s house. They were unaware that Sri Poornananda Swamy was residing in their house. As they finished singing, Swamiji invited them inside into His room. That was the very first darshan.
Swamiji enquired as to who sang the song. My wife, Rangadevi replied, “It was me”.
“It was very nice. Can you sing again for me?”, asked Swamiji and she sang again.
After that day, it became a habit to visit Swamiji every evening and sing bhajans and keerthans. A few days later, Swamiji visited our house and we had the fortune of performing abhishekam to Him, while chanting Srisuktham. In this way, our attachment to Swamiji started deepening.
All the ladies of Project Colony would gather thrice in a week in each other’s houses and sing bhajans. They once expressed their will of learning Bhagavad-Gita to my wife, Rangadevi. Just as they finished learning Bhagavad-Gita, Swamiji had arrived in Pochampaadu. One day, they invited Swamiji to the bhajan program. Through Swamiji’s divine hands, they gifted a silver idol of Lord Krishna, a scripture called Gita Mukarandam and a gold ring studded with a pearl to Rangadevi. Swamiji Himself giving them to Rangadevi is a huge blessing. It was the same time Swamiji referred to Rangadevi as Githamatha for the first time. Over time, all of Swamiji’s devotees also started referring to her as Githamatha.
When Swamiji decided to make the Bhuvaneswari Yantram, girls below 15 years were asked to pick flowers from a plate and hand them over to Swamiji. My elder daughter, Padma also was a part of it. Maybe Swamiji willed to choose the house of the girl who picked 5 flowers. As soon as Padma picked 5 flowers and handed them to Swamiji, owing to our multiple lives’ fortune, He chose our house to stay and make the Bhuvaneswari Yantram. During the making of the yantram, Swamiji would only eat curd rice in the morning and night. Due to His habit, Swamiji would also have coffee in the middle. As the making of the yantram came to an end, Sri Rama Navami celebrations started in the Ramalayam of Project Colony. For that occasion, many singers and musicians visited the colony and would daily come to have Swamiji’s darshan and would sing bhajans before the Bhuvaneswari Yantram. All the ladies in the colony would perform Kumkumaarchana to the yantram in Swamiji’s presence. In this way, with Swamiji’s grace, many rituals were grandly performed to Bhuvaneswari Amma. After the making of the yantram, it became customary to name a baby girl born in the Project Colony as Bhuvana or Bhuvaneswari.
During the celebrations of Sri Rama Navami, Sri Peethambarachari garu, the Principal of Warangal Music College visited the Project Colony. He had Swamiji’s darshan and in the presence of the yantram, he sang ‘Mohana Rama’ song, composed in the Mohana Raaga. Swamiji was extremely happy on hearing Mohana Raaga, one of His favourites and blessed Peethambarachari garu. Later, I was told by Peethambarachari garu that he never again was able to sing that song in the same way.
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